NAIROBI: Outgoing Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo will be granted an "amnesty" if he steps aside peacefully, the African Union mediator in the crisis, Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga, said Wednesday.
"There will be an amnesty for him in that he will not be prosecuted or persecuted," Odinga told journalists on his return from a two-day trip to the Ivory Coast capital Abidjan.
"And in the event that he decides to remain in the country, he will be allowed to go about his business normally," the Kenyan Prime Minister said.
Odinga had joined presidents Ernest Bai Koroma of Sierra Leone, Pedro Pires of Cape Verde and Boni Yayi of Benin, who were sent by the West African economic grouping ECOWAS in a bid to convince Gbagbo to step down and relinquish power to Alassane Ouattara.
Ouattara has been recognized by the international community as the legitimate winner of the Nov. 28 presidential polls, but Gbagbo has refused to step aside.
