Abidjan - Cocoa crops in the world's top producer, Ivory Coast, are being ravaged by caterpillars but authorities are playing down the new scourge, saying they have it under control.

Abidjan - Ivory Coast's feisty former first lady Simone Gbagbo went on trial Tuesday for crimes against humanity in what many see as a litmus case for justice in the west African country.

Abidjan - Ivory Coast's former first lady Simone Gbagbo goes on trial Tuesday for crimes against humanity, but rights groups acting as plaintiffs in the case have pulled out, blasting the proceedings as flawed.

Abidjan - Ivorian rights groups acting as plaintiffs in the imminent trial of former first lady Simone Gbagbo for crimes against humanity pulled out of the process Monday, saying it was flawed.

Abidjan - Ivory Coast's former first lady Simone Gbagbo will be tried for crimes against humanity starting Tuesday, having already been jailed for 20 years for her part in 2010's post-electoral violence.

Abidjan - Ivory Coast police arrested a driver who allegedly transported weapons used in a jihadist attack on the Grand-Bassam beach resort that killed 19 people in March, security sources said.

Abidjan - Ivory Coast's supreme court has rejected former first lady Simone Gbagbo's appeal against a 20-year sentence over her role in the violence that followed the 2010 elections that her husband Laurent Gbagbo lost, her lawyer said.

Abidjan - Some like creams, others pop pills or splash out on padded panties. In Ivory Coast where "big is beautiful" bottom enhancers come in all shapes and sorts, and at any cost.

Abidjan - France will increase the number of its troops in Ivory Coast, Defence Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said Friday on a trip to the African nation which hosts a regional base for French forces.

Abidjan - "At five years old, I went to work in the fields with my dad. Today, my children go to school," said Peter, a cocoa farmer in Bonikro in the centre of Ivory Coast.

Abidjan - Papa Wemba, one of Africa's greatest music stars, died on Sunday after collapsing on stage during a festival in Ivory Coast.

Grand-bassam - Dressed in flowing red robes, a traditional religious group gathers on the beach to purify sands left bloodied by the unprecedented jihadist attack that killed 19 people in Ivory Coast.

Grand-bassam - The toll from a deadly attack in Ivory Coast by an Al-Qaeda affiliate rose to 19 on Wednesday, with the body of a young man shot in the head found on the beach.

Abidjan - France vowed Tuesday to step up anti-terrorist cooperation in Africa after Al-Qaeda's North African branch said it carried out a deadly weekend attack on an Ivory Coast beach resort.

Grand-bassam - At least five people were killed on Sunday when heavily-armed gunmen opened fire in the Ivory Coast resort town of Grand-Bassam, leaving bodies strewn on the beach.

Abidjan - Laurent Gbagbo once fought for democracy in Ivory Coast, but his inability to let go of power proved his downfall and he pushed his once-prosperous country to the brink of civil war.

Abidjan - Charles Ble Goude, right-hand man to disgraced former Ivorian president Laurent Gbagbo, was nicknamed "the General of the Streets" but insists he had no role in the deadly violence that has landed him at the International Criminal Court.

Abidjan - Laurent Gbagbo once fought for democracy in Ivory Coast, but his inability to let go of power proved his downfall and he pushed his once-prosperous country to the brink of civil war.

Abidjan - Ivory Coast's government resigned on Wednesday after President Alassane Ouattara vowed to bring more "efficiency" to the West African state just two months after he was re-elected.

Abidjan - Some 4,000 child victims of "slavery and exploitation" were removed from cocoa plantations in Ivory Coast between 2012 and 2014, authorities fighting child labour in the world's top cocoa producer have said.