Dominique de Villepin, French Foreign Minister, made a short visit to Ivory Coast on Sunday, in a sign of warming relations between Paris and its former colony after a civil war that fuelled anti-French sentiment.

Villepin and Ivorian President Laurent Gbagbo exchanged smiles and handshakes at length before the cameras, a far cry from the tension that marked the French minister?s last trip to the West African country in January 2003.

During that visit, Villepin had to be rescued by Gbagbo from a hostile crowd blocking his exit from the president?s home. Gbagbo then refused to take Villepin?s phone calls for months while anti-French riots rocked the main city of Abidjan.

?I am here a year later. What do I see? This country is going forward (...) this country is making peace with itself, this country has a future,? Villepin told a news conference. ?France and Ivory Coast are marching hand in hand to make the last, remaining steps,? he said.

Relations between France and what was once its most stable West African former colony have been strained since the civil war, which erupted from a failed coup attempt against Laurent Gbagbo in 2002. France brokered a peace deal in January last year and sent 4,000 troops to police a ceasefire but Gbagbo?s camp accused Paris of siding with the rebels who started the war, officially declared over last July.

With a fragile peace in the country ? still split between a rebel-held north and government-controlled south ? French-Ivorian ties have improved in recent weeks.

Gbagbo is due to meet French President Jacques Chirac in Paris on Thursday ? a trip initially planned late last year but cancelled after the murder of a French journalist in Abidjan.