ABIDJAN (Reuters) - Dozens of people left a district of Ivory Coast's commercial capital on Sunday after gun battles, and presidential claimant Alassane Ouattara made it back from an AU summit, despite concerns about his security.
Incumbent Laurent Gbagbo's camp issued a defiant message against the AU for proposing he cede power to Ouattara.
Residents of the northern Abobo district of Abidjan said clashes between forces loyal to Gbagbo and those supporting Ouattara continued all Saturday, but had died down on Sunday.
"People are starting to leave because they fear more combat," said Issa Dembele, a resident of Abobo. "Personally, I'm preparing to evacuate my own family."
The United Nations estimates about 200,000 people -- most of Abobo's population -- have left in the past two weeks.
Gbago has refused to step down after a November presidential election, which Ouattara is recognised internationally as having won, after U.N.-certified results showed he got an 8-point lead.
After weeks of mediation by a panel of five African presidents, the African Union (AU) re-affirmed recognition of Ouattara as president-elect, at a summit he attended but Gbagbo did not, and proposed a unity government led by him on Friday.
"We ... would like to reaffirm our total rejection of this proposition," Gbagbo's senior aide Pascal Affi N'Guessan told reporters in Abidjan, saying it was "without any justification."
Ouattara returned from the AU summit on Sunday, spokesman Patrick Achi said, after a trip via Nigeria, despite concerns by the U.N. mission that it would be difficult to get him back in.
Forces loyal to Gbagbo launched an assault on Saturday to drive fighters loyal to Ouattara out of Abobo, although residents said those fighters still controlled several areas.
The latest African Union effort to mediate in the dispute failed this week, adding to fears of a return to civil war in the world's top cocoa grower, whose crisis has pushed cocoa futures to regular 32-year highs in recent weeks.
"Things are calm now, apart from gunfire here and there. But people are leaving," said Abobo resident Tiemoko Souala.
Sanctions such as a ban on European ships using Ivorian ports supplies of Ivory Coast's cocoa have virtually dried up.
About 400 people have already been killed in post-election violence according to the United Nations, while some 450,000 Ivorians have fled their homes for fear of attacks. Around 90,000 have sought refuge in neighbouring Liberia.
(Reporting by Tim Cocks and Loucoumane Coulibaly; Writing by Tim Cocks; editing by Matthew Jones)
