“They looked at his identity card and shot him dead” Six months of post-electoral violence in Côte d’Ivoire 25 they said that he was not from the neighbourhood and accused him of being a rebel. They put several tyres around his neck, he was still alive when they set fire to the tyres. After their hideous crime, these Young Patriots made war cries and started shouting: 'We caught a rebel'. His body was half charred by the time his brother came to find him. He told the killers that their victim was not a Dioula." On that same day in Yopougon, near the Banco II technical college, two 25 year-old men were detained because they were Dioulas. They were beaten up and then a tyre was placed around each of their necks and the Young Patriots set them on fire. An eyewitness told Amnesty International: "The Young Patriots said: ‘if you are a Dioula, it's the same as being a rebel’. Some women who were selling produce in the neighbourhood protested. They told the Patriots that they knew that one of the two people detained had nothing to do with the rebellion and worked in the neighbourhood. But it was too late." In other cases, the public did not dare to intervene even when they were aware that the victim was known in the neighbourhood. At the Gouro market in Yopougon, on 26 February 2011, the day after Charles Blé Goudé's speech, people working at the market witnessed the death of a man pushing a wheelbarrow, who was killed by Young Patriots manning a roadblock. An eyewitness told Amnesty International: "One of the Young Patriots said he did not know him and they said: ‘He's a Dioula, therefore he is from Burkina Faso, therefore he is a rebel’. They stripped him and beat him up. During this time, the man was looking around at us because we, market traders, knew him, but we were afraid to speak up for him. We felt bad about it, especially because they killed this brother of ours right in front of us. The Young Patriots put a tyre round his neck, poured petrol over his body and set fire to him. The victim's nickname was Tchédjan (which means 'the big man' in dioula)." In other cases, people have been denounced to the Young Patriots. For example, the manager of a phone booth denounced a man because he heard him say 'Abobo'17 several times during a telephone conversation. An eyewitness said: "The Young Patriots hit him and accused him of being a rebel. He denied it and said he had come to see his sister in Yopougon. But the Patriots did not want to understand and said: ‘We are not having any rebels in Laurent Gbagbo's Yopougon.’ They put a tyre around his neck, sprayed petrol on him and set him alight. For a moment, he moved his feet in struggle and one of them finished him off with a machete." People wearing a boubou (traditional clothing) or amulets (considered to provide magical protection) were attacked by the young militia men who acted as roadblock guards and checked the identity of people passing through. For example, on 28 February 2011, Bakayoko Lassana was captured by Young Patriots who accused him of being a ‘rebel’ because he wore amulets. They beat him up and used a tyre to burn him to death. A relative of the victim expressed his pain at not being able to recover the body. "We feel very upset because he will not be buried. At the village, they organized a short ceremony, but it is not the same thing, because we have not carried out the ceremony to mark his death and we cannot mourn for him. We find it difficult to accept that he has gone when his death cannot be marked in this way. There's something not right about it. If we had Index: AFR 31/002/2011 Amnesty International May 2011