Fans of rival Ivorian clubs clash

The game at the Houphouet-Boigny stadium was stopped for more than 40 minutes

Rival football supporters in Ivory Coast have clashed at a league game between the two main teams in Abidjan on Sunday , leaving one person dead and more than thirty others injured.

Witnesses said rival fans from Abidjan's main clubs, Asec Mimosa and Africa Sports, started throwing stones after Asec scored a second goal in the 43rd minute against Africa Sports.

Some accounts say that it was angry Africa Sports fans who first started throwing stones and bottles onto the pitch.

The match (at the Houphouet-Boigny stadium) had to be halted for about forty minutes after a stampede broke out.

The police reportedly fired tear gas shells to restore order.

Asec eventually won the match 3-1.

Africa's bad image

The latest football-related violence in Africa comes close on the heels of similar violence at local derbies in South Africa and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Fourty-three fans died at the Ellis Park stadium in Johannesburg on Wednesday 11 April, when overcrowding during a league game between arch-rivals Kaizer Chiefs and Orlando pirates resulted in a fatal stampede.

Just about two weeks later (on 29 April) in the southern city of Lubumbashi in the Democratic Republic of Congo nearly ten people were killed and dozens more were injured when violence broke out during a local league derby between Mazembe and Lupopo.

These incidents have cast a cloud over Fifa's pledge that Africa would host the 2010 World Cup.