'Don't lynch' child kidnap suspects: Ivory Coast police

Abidjan (AFP) - Ivory Coast police on Friday urged people not to lynch those suspected of kidnapping children, as has already happened in a country traumatised by a string of child murders.

In such cases "we need the people to inform the authorities and not take justice into their own hands," police spokesman Dorgeles Gnawa told AFP, citing several recent cases of vigilante-style beatings.

The police called for calm. "Don't lynch suspects thought to be child kidnappers," the force said in a statement.

Over the past three months, police have logged 25 child kidnap-murders throughout the west African nation.

In most cases the mutilated body was found, often without the head or genitals, raising fears of a wave of ritual sacrifices.

In one case a beggar who asked a woman with a little girl for money was badly beaten by a crowd of people, Gnawa said.

In Abidjan on Thursday a young man was beaten while taking his two children to school, witnesses said.

Ivorian Interior Minister Hamed Balayoko this week announced that 1,500 were being mobilised to tackle the core problem of child kidnappings.

The impoverished west African nation, which has suffered a decade of political and military crisis, is set to hold a presidential election in October.

Rumours circulate widely during election years of kidnappings, notably of albinos, for ritual sacrifices.