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| - Guinean President Alpha Conde, whose controversial plan to seek a third term in October 18 polls has sparked deadly protests, said Tuesday he would honour the outcome of the vote in the poor West African state. "It's extraordinary that I should be seen as an anti-democratic dictator," Conde said in an interview with French news outlets France 24 and RFI. "I fought for 45 years, I was in the opposition," said the 82-year-old, who pushed through a constitutional referendum this year which reset the two-term presidential limit to zero. "My adversaries are civil servants who became prime ministers after bringing the country to its knees," he said, brushing away suggestions that he wants to become "president for life". Asked whether he would accept the result, he replied: "I am a democrat." A former opposition activist, Conde became Guinea's first democratically elected president in 2010 after decades of authoritarian rule in the former French colony. He won re-election five years later. Today, rights groups accuse him of veering towards authoritarianism. Protests against Conde's suspected ambition to stay in power that began in October 2019 have been severely repressed in the country of some 13 million people. Last week, Amnesty International said in a report that at least 50 people were killed in the crackdown through July this year and criticised the government for failing to hold the security forces accountable. "I don't take Amnesty International seriously," Conde told the French media. "They do biased investigations, one-sided reports." Conde also brushed aside accusations of fomenting ethnic divides and of having referred to the presidential campaign as a "war". Guinea's politics are mostly drawn along ethnic lines, Conde's party largely backed by the Malinke people and main challenger Cellou Dalein Diallo's UFDG by the Fulani -- although both insist they are pluralist. "I have always said that the political fight is a competition, and that people should choose according to (the candidates') platforms," he said. cf/pid/stb/gd/jj
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