"The uprising has sparked ethnic, political and religious hostilities that divide Ivory Coast's predominantly Christian south and its largely Muslim north.
The mutineers, dismissed from the army for suspected loyalty to ousted former junta leader Gen. Robert Guei, have found at least a measure of support from the Muslim northerners -- who complain of being treated as second-class citizens by the southern-based government.
Tens of thousands of Westerners and hundreds of thousands of immigrants from neighboring Muslim countries have made their homes in Ivory Coast, until its first-ever 1999 coup an anchor of stability and prosperity in West Africa.
Ivory Coast is the world's largest cocoa-producer, and remains an economic powerhouse for the region.
The nation's Muslim, African immigrants are much more vulnerable than the Westerners in the unrest, with much less hope of rescue. Paramilitary police burned a shantytown -- housing numbers of Muslim immigrants and northerners -- over the weekend." (in part)
http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/world/wire/sns-ap-ivory-coast0925sep25,0,4206007.story?coll=sns%2Dap%2Dworld%2Dheadlines