30 Nov 2011

Former Ivory Coast leader detained by ICC

9:36 pm on 30 November 2011

Former Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo has arrived in the Netherlands where he is being detained by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in the Hague.

The BBC reports he left the northern town of Korhogo - where he has been under house arrest after being issued with an arrest warrant.

He is being held in an ICC detention centre and is expected to appear before the court next week.

The ICC says in a statement that Mr Gbagbo is charged with four counts of crimes against humanity, namely murder, rape and other forms of sexual violence, persecution and other inhuman acts.

They were allegedly committed between December 2010 and April 2011.

The charges arise from the court investigation into alleged war crimes during unrest in Ivory Coast in the wake of a presidential election in 2010.

More than 3000 ivorians died in the violence that erupted after Mr Gbagbo refused to step down as president, despite his rival Alassane Ouattara being internationally recognised as the winner of the poll.

Mr Gbagbo had been was president of the Ivory Coast for ten years, during which time the country was virtually partitioned by civil war.