Ivory Coast has issued an arrest warrant for Guillaume Soro, a former rebel leader and candidate in next year's presidential election, four government sources said on Monday, just before he was due to return home after more than six months overseas.
Soro diverted his Ivory Coast-bound private flight from Paris to neighbouring Ghana "for security reasons", his adviser, Alain Lobognon, told Reuters. Lobognon said he was not aware of an arrest warrant.The sources provided no details about the specific allegations against Soro. A police spokesman said he did not know about the warrant.
Soro, 47, led the rebels who tried and failed to oust then-president Laurent Gbagbo in 2002, before installing Alassane Ouattara in the presidency during a brief civil war after a disputed 2010 election.
Soro has since fallen out with Ouattara, who is widely expected to back his prime minister, Amadou Gon Coulibaly, in the 2020 presidential election.
But Ouattara said last month he would run for another term if his predecessors, Gbabgo and Henri Konan Bedie, were candidates.
