Ivory Coast solution to take time: Nigeria

Nigeria's president warned Tuesday that a solution to Ivory Coast's deepening political crisis will take time, after the internationally recognized winner of the election said a military intervention should now be considered to oust the incumbent.

A high-level regional delegation paid renegade leader Laurent Gbagbo a second visit on Monday and urged him to step down, but he rebuffed their appeal. Leaders from the nations of Benin, Cape Verde and Sierra Leone then travelled to Nigeria to meet with Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan, the current chairman of the 15-nation regional bloc ECOWAS, theEconomic Community Of West African States

"Anything that has to do with crisis in nation, it takes time," Jonathan told reporters in the Nigerian capital of Abuja where meetings wereheld Tuesday. "Don't expect that if there is a major crisis in a country, you just jump in in one week and the matter is resolved."

ECOWAS and the African Union later released a statement indicating that Gbagbo had "agreed to negotiate a peaceful end to the crisis without any preconditions." But the statement did not elaborate on what actions that would entail other than lifting a blockade around the hotel where his rival is based, and Gbagbo had not relinquished power Tuesday. The statement also called on Gbagbo to hand over power "without further delay."

The regional bloc has threatened to use military force to oust Gbagbo, who has clung to power more than a month after the United Nations said he lost the presidential run-off vote to rival Alassane Ouattara after a decade in power. The delegation's first effort last week to force him into exile failed, and there were no signs that Gbagbo had softened his position after Monday's followup meeting.

"For us, the discussion is finished," Ouattara said after meeting with the African leaders on Monday. They had presented Gbagbo with an amnesty deal if he steps down ... ECOWAS will need to use all the means at its disposal including the use of legitimate force so that the president that was elected can assume his functions."

Col. Mohammed Yerima, a Nigerian military spokesman, said defence chiefs from ECOWAS member states met last week to begin strategizing what sort of assault they would use if talks fail. Analysts, though, have questioned how quickly ECOWAS could mobilize a force and whether they could remove Gbagbo without a full-scale invasion resulting in heavy civilian casualties.

Army backing

Despite increasing international pressure, including visa bans by the European Union and the U.S., Gbagbo has stayed in power with the backing of the army. Human rights groups accuse his security forces of abducting and killing hundreds of political opponents. The UN has been barred entry from a building believed to be housing 60 to 80 of the bodies.

Even as Gbagbo's meeting with the African leaders was going on, his closest advisers continued to insist that the 65-year-old had won the election.

Ouattara has been shut out of the institutions of power in Ivory Coast but is attempting to govern from a hotel in Abidjan where he and his staff are barricaded behind sandbags and razor wire. He is protected by United Nations peacekeepers, but Gbagbo's security forces have set up checkpoints on the roads leading to the hotel, barring anyone from entering or exiting.

In recent weeks, getting supplies to the Golf Hotel has become increasingly difficult, and the UN started running daily helicopter flights that land on the hotel's lawn ferrying cartons of vegetables and tins of powdered milk.

In Washington, U.S. officials said they remain willing to help Gbagbo make a "dignified exit," including revisiting the visa ban so he can travel to the United States and take up a possible teaching position. They said the window of opportunity is rapidly closing.