Ivory Coast’s democratically elected leader says his forces will not capture the entrenched incumbent who has been holed up for days in an underground bunker at the presidential residence, and instead will wait for him to run out of food and water.

An armed group trying to install Ivory Coast’s internationally recognised president has surrounded a bunker the country’s strongman refuses to leave, saying they will wait for him to come out.

The United Nations Security Council has demanded an immediate end to the escalating violence in Ivory Coast and imposed sanctions on Laurent Gbagbo, who has refused to relinquish the presidency, and his inner circle.