Summary executions of civilians The attacks on civilians—particularly the killings in places like Daloa, Monoko-Zohi, and Man—appear to have been carried out with the aim of systematically eliminating all individuals suspected of supporting the rebels. The targeting of specific individuals was often undertaken with the assistance of part of the local civilian population, mostly Bété or Gueré youth groups or civilian militias. Human Rights Watch received numerous accounts describing how civilians pointed out potential supporters of the rebels to the government armed forces. Based on lists of names and on this physical identification of homes by civilians, members of the government forces would then arbitrarily arrest and execute the individuals. Human Rights Watch gathered information on over 250 cases of summary executions by the Ivorian armed forces in a variety of towns in the west and verified over forty such cases. This figure does not include the dozens of individuals who were last seen in government custody and have “disappeared” or the dozens of cases of individuals who were killed in remote settlements in rural areas, and is therefore very likely a serious underestimation of the total number of victims. It also does not include the estimated hundreds of victims of assassinations in Abidjan and other areas in the southwest. The first such large-scale series of summary executions by government forces documented by Human Rights Watch took place in Daloa in October 2002, after the government regained control of the town. The “cleaning” of Daloa: October 15-20, 2002 Daloa town lies in the Haut-Sassandra region, originally a largely Bété area where substantial numbers of northerners and immigrants have settled in both the town and the rural villages over the years. Ethnically, the town and region of Daloa have changed enormously in the past decades due to internal migration and immigration. While the Bété retain a substantial presence in the area and a strong affiliation for the ruling FPI party, the population of northern Ivorians and Burkinabé immigrants has grown significantly. In March 2001, the RDR won the municipal elections, giving the town its first RDR mayor and providing a serious shock to the Bété and others who supported the ruling FPI party. Daloa is among the largest towns in the country and a key transit point for crop harvests, given its location on the edge of the cocoa, coffee and cotton belts, and its road connections to San Pedro, Yamassoukrou and Abidjan. The MPCI rebels moved south from Vavoua and arrived in Daloa on October 11. Clashes with loyalist forces took place in the Lobia II quarter for several hours on the evening of October 11, resulting in the rebels capturing Daloa on October 12 and occupying the various military camps. Loyalist reinforcements, including Angolan mercenaries, arrived in the afternoon on October 13, and fighting recommenced, continuing until dawn, when the government forces re-captured Daloa. One individual, who was involved in the collection of the corpses following the fighting noted, “we counted about sixteen bodies, of which eight were collected from the military camp after the fighting and others were found around the camps of the gendarmerie.”35 These bodies were combatants from both sides. So-called cleaning-up operations began in the town, initiated by the forces of the Brigade Anti-Emeute (BAE)— the paramilitary, anti-riot squads—who arrived in Daloa on October 14, 2002. On October 15, an article in the government newspaper Notre Voie stated that “the assailants found refuge in the quarters of the Dioula, who are favorable to them.” The article continued, “certain guns abandoned by the aggressors were collected by young RDR members who, since the beginning of the Daloa attack, have done nothing but support the actions of the terrorists, applauding them in their passage through their quarters.”36 Whatever the truth of the last allegation, between October 14 – 20, after the loyalists had regained control of the town, more civilians died as a result of summary executions by government forces than in any of the fighting of the preceding days. According to credible sources, the “ratissage” or combing operation of the BAE resulted in the killings of at least fifty-six people. Among these, forty-two were identified, many of them rich immigrant 35 Human Rights Watch interview, Daloa, April 1, 2003. 36 Vincent Deh,“Daloa: L’armée riposte fort,” Notre Voie, October 15, 2002, p. 3 Human Rights Watch 15 August 2003, Vol. 15, No. 14 (A)