Former Ivory Coast Leader Seeks Safety Assurance

A party member of exiled Ivory Coast politician Guillaume Soro says he is ready to return home but wants assurances from the government that he will be safe. The government last week reiterated its call for Soro to return if he wants to. Government spokesperson Amadou Coulibaly said President Alassane Ouattara has created the conditions for exiled Ivorians to return home. Soro, a former Prime Minister, was convicted and sentenced in absentia to 20 years for destabilizing the Ivorian government. Saibou Sidibe, a member of Soro’s Generation and People in Solidarity (GPS) party, tells VOA’s James Butty, the government must offer Soro the same arrangement that made it possible for former President Laurent Gbagbo to return