Say What?: Ivory Coast Spends $8 mil in NYC

The government of Ivory Coast, a country where nearly half the population earns less than $1.36 per day, has dropped $8 million on new offices for its Permanent Mission to the United Nations, say New York City deeds, according to the New York Observer. Alcide Djedje, the mission’s ambassador, signed the deed on September 30 for a commercial condominium on the East Side of Manhattan owned by Philips International.

The Ivory Coast is the world’s largest producer of cocoa, and is still recovering from a recent civil war in which it was divided into a rebel-controlled north and government-controlled south.–BB