France will nearly
double the number of troops it has in Ivory Coast, the defense minister said on
Saturday on a visit during which he laid flowers at the site of an attack on
tourists that killed 19 people.
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Jean-Yves Le Drian placed a bouquet on the beach in Grand
Bassam, a resort town 40 km (25 miles) from Abidjan, where gunmen shot swimmers
and sunbathers before storming hotels last month, an attack claimed by Al Qaeda
in the Islamic Maghreb.
Four French citizens
were killed.
Le Drian said France, the former colonial power,
would increase its contingent of troops in Ivory Coast to 900 from 550.
"We
need to reinforce coordination in an intelligence capacity at the same time as
in an intervention capacity in the whole of West Africa," the defense
minister said.
Reuters
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