There were mercenaries working with Gbagbo—Angolans and South Africans—who were the advance troops, they arrived before the loyalists came into Man. People were able to move around the town, the curfew was 19:00 and the mercenaries were okay. The Angolans had yellow uniforms very different from the Ivorian army uniforms. They didn’t speak French, when you said something, they didn’t understand. The South Africans were mostly white…they gave people bread and wore khaki and tricots. Then the loyalist troops came, things changed. They imposed a curfew of 16:00 and forbid people to move around. I stayed in after that….When you get up in the morning, you go outside and you would see bodies on the road. I heard of many killings in the other quartiers, but those I know are the ones from my quartier, like my neighbor, Yacouba Sylla. He was a Dioula, an Ivorian originally from Odienné. He was working in transport—he had five trucks. At this time, when the loyalists came to Man, he was the only person in his house, because the rest of his family had escaped. Sylla stayed because of his transport business. There were four gendarmes who came to Sylla’s courtyard. They came in a four-by-four, in uniform, and they carried machine guns. They knocked on the door, and when Sylla arrived, they began to beat him. They said, ‘You the Dioula, you support the rebels.’ Sylla protested that he was innocent, but they beat him. They shot him twice, then searched the house for guns but they didn’t find anything. The family had already fled. In the morning, when I left my house, his body was lying in the street. With some other people from the quartier, we brought the body to the hospital morgue and called one of Sylla’s sons, in Biankouma. He was too afraid to come to Man to take care of the body, he asked us to ask the local Muslim community to help. I left Man soon after that, so I don’t know what happened to the body. 54 The majority of civilians targeted by government forces in Man were thought to be Yacouba and Dioula youths suspected of sympathies towards the rebels. In practice, this often translated into targeting members of the RDR or the UDPCI, the western-based party that supported General Guei. Individuals working in the transport industry were also suspect, as shown above, according to the logic used by the armed forces. Suspicions could fall on an individual simply because he carried an amulet or a certain kind of ring and was therefore thought to be a combatant who needed magical protection or a “dozo,” one of the traditional hunters recruited by the MPCI. As in other places controlled by government forces, a number of the victims were identified from lists of names compiled by local authorities and civilians. Another witness interviewed by Human Rights Watch described this period of government control: There were many killings under the loyalists. If the loyalists found you with an amulet ring, then they would kill you because they suspected it was a protection from fighting. They made a mass grave—there were so many deaths…. Matthias, the president of the UDPCI-youth, he was taken by the loyalists and we never saw him again. There were many killings, and the family had no rights to ask about what happened. When we talk about the loyalists, it’s the gendarmes and police, but also the Angolans and South Africans. It was the gendarmes from Abidjan who did the killings though. The local gendarmes were mostly killed in the fighting when the rebels took the town….There were many bodies in the streets, some decomposing. The loyalists also left many bodies in the cemetery. [They] would take bodies in military trucks to the cemetery to bury them, or just leave them there. 55 As these killings were taking place, the Ivorian army spokesperson stated, “the cleaning operation and the consolidation of republican forces is on-going in the town and vicinity of Man. Life has returned to normal in that area.”56 Ten days later, the rebels re-captured Man. 54 Human Rights Watch interview, Mali, February 19, 2003. 55 Human Rights Watch interview, Mali, February 19, 2003. 56 Statement transcribed from Radio Côte d’Ivoire in le jour, December 7-8, 2002, p.2. The statement concluded by announcing a new set of security measures aimed at Abidjan under the curfew hours. The measures included, for instance, a warning that the armed forces would fire without warning on any suspect individuals, a use of force that clearly violates international standards. Human Rights Watch 19 August 2003, Vol. 15, No. 14 (A)