Deposed Leader of Ivory Coast Flees to Togo

NAIROBI, Kenya — The deposed president of Ivory Coast fled the West African nation Sunday, leaving the government to a military junta and defusing a brewing confrontation with France, the country’s former colonial ruler.

The French Foreign Ministry announced that President Henri Konan Bedie flew with his family and a few associates to Lome, the capital of Togo.

A Togolese official said Bedie was accepted in the country on “humanitarian grounds” but probably would leave in a few days for an as-yet-unannounced destination.

Bedie, 65, left as 300 French troops stood by to enter Ivory Coast in the name of protecting the approximately 20,000 French nationals there. The troops are to reinforce a permanent garrison of 550.

Ivory Coast’s self-appointed president, Gen. Robert Guei, 58, had warned France against sending the reinforcements, suggesting that it should not use disorder in Abidjan to justify returning Bedie to power. But after three days of looting and shooting by troops whose mutiny sparked the takeover, the city had returned to relative calm Sunday.

The Christmas Eve coup ended 39 years of rule by the Democratic Party. Guei has promised elections that will return the country to “real democracy.”