ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast — Mutinous soldiers in Ivory Coast shot three people on Saturday and cut off access to the second-largest city, Bouaké, as a revolt escalated over demands for bonus payments.
The revolt began in Bouaké early on Friday and spread quickly, following a pattern similar to a mutiny by the same group in January that paralyzed parts of Ivory Coast.
Mutineers seized control of the national military headquarters and the Defense Ministry in the center of the commercial capital, Abidjan, on Friday.
They stepped up the pressure on Saturday, blocking roads out of Bouaké, the center of January’s uprising, and protesting in several other locations, including the northern city of Korhogo, where two men on a motorcycle were shot in the legs as they tried to force their way through a roadblock set up by the mutineers.
ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast — Mutinous soldiers in Ivory Coast shot three people on Saturday and cut off access to the second-largest city, Bouaké, as a revolt escalated over demands for bonus payments.
The revolt began in Bouaké early on Friday and spread quickly, following a pattern similar to a mutiny by the same group in January that paralyzed parts of Ivory Coast.
Mutineers seized control of the national military headquarters and the Defense Ministry in the center of the commercial capital, Abidjan, on Friday.
They stepped up the pressure on Saturday, blocking roads out of Bouaké, the center of January’s uprising, and protesting in several other locations, including the northern city of Korhogo, where two men on a motorcycle were shot in the legs as they tried to force their way through a roadblock set up by the mutineers.
“They shot at them,” said a witness, Amadou Yeo. “They were wounded and transported to the hospital.”
In Bouaké, soldiers fired on a group of demobilized former rebels, seriously wounding one of them, according to their spokesman and a local lawmaker. Sgt. Seydou Kone, a spokesman for the mutineers, said the former rebels, who went through a disarmament program after the country’s 2011 civil war, were planning their own protest, as they did earlier in the week, and his men had opened fire to stop them.
“We do not want to negotiate with anyone,” Sergeant Kone said by phone from Bouaké, in the center of the country. “We’re also ready to fight if we are attacked. We have nothing to lose.”
In a statement on state television late on Friday, Gen. Sékou Touré, the army’s chief of staff, threatened the soldiers with severe sanctions if they did not end the revolt.
Ivory Coast’s defense minister and a government spokesman were not reachable for comment on Saturday.
Newsletter Sign Up
Thank you for subscribing.
An error has occurred. Please try again later.
You are already subscribed to this email.
View all New York Times newsletters.
The soldiers were promised bonus payments by the government after the January mutiny, but the government has struggled to disburse the money in the wake of a budget crunch caused by the collapse in the price of cocoa, Ivory Coast’s main export.
Ivory Coast has emerged as one of the world’s fastest-growing economies after a decade-long political crisis that ended with a civil war in 2011. Deep divisions persist, particularly in a military assembled from former rebel and loyalist combatants.
The government has already paid 8,400 soldiers — most of them former rebels who helped lift President Alassane Ouattara to power — bonuses of 5 million francs each, or about $8,400, as part of a deal to end the January mutiny.
On Thursday, after a meeting with the authorities in Abidjan, a spokesman for the group said it would drop demands for remaining bonuses of 7 million francs. But that decision was rejected by some of the soldiers.
“We want our 7 million and that’s it,” Sergeant Kone said.
Bouaké residents said shops remained closed as soldiers fired weapons in the air and patrolled the streets in cars.
Mutineers also took control of the northern city of Odienné and there was sporadic gunfire in Daloa, the main cocoa growing hub in southwestern Ivory Coast and the world’s top producer of the crop.
Hundreds of people gathered for a rally against the revolt close to the military headquarters in Abidjan, which was still being held by the mutineers.
Sergeant Kone said the mutineers were also active in Man, near the western border with Liberia, and Bondoukou in the east.
We’re interested in your feedback on this page. Tell us what you think.
