ABIDJAN, Oct 12 (AFP) - Ivory Coast President Laurent Gbagbo fired Defence Minister Moise Lida Kouassi Saturday and took personal control of the portfolio as the government army battles rebels who have taken over half the west African country, officials said. The embattled Kouassi was switched to the presidency ministry, state television announced. The defence ministry was left vacant, but Bertin Kadet, a newly appointed junior security minister, was named minister attached to the presidency responsible for defence and civil protection. This means that Kadet will take his instructions directly from the president, who will become de facto defence minister, Mamadou Koulibaly, the president of the National Assembly, told AFP. "The president is positioning himself to wage the war as he wants to -- that is, to switch from being on the defensive to going on the offensive, it's a new strategy," Koulibaly said. --------------------------- Ivory Coast's former ruling party urges government to negotiate ABIDJAN, Oct 12 (AFP) - Ivory Coast's former ruling party on Saturday urged the government to tread "the path of negotiation," saying a three-week-old uprising by mutineers and soldiers who have returned from exile threatened to degenerate into ethnic and religious conflict. The Democratic Party of Ivory Coast (PDCI), which ruled the west African nation from independence from France in 1960 until a coup d'etat on Christmas Day, 1999, voiced concern over what it said was a rapidly worsening "socio-economic situation" and called for dialogue as "the only path to a peaceful and lasting resolution of the conflict". The party is headed by Henri Konan Bedie, who took over from founding president Felix Houphouet-Boigny in 1993 and ruled until he was ousted by General Robert Guei, then a former military chief who was in retirement. Guei lost violence-wracked elections in 2000 to current President Laurent Gbagbo, and was killed in Abidjan on September 19, the first day of the uprising. Bedie has made virtually no public pronouncements since then. Gbagbo on Tuesday said in a nationally broadcast speech that he was ready to talk with the rebels who now hold the predominantly Muslim north of the west African nation, but only on condition that they disarm first. The rebels rejected his precondition. The PDCI also called on the rebels to "take the government's extended hand, " without explicitly asking them to disarm. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To unsubscribe/subscribe or view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to: [log in to unmask] ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~