ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast ? Loyalist troops put down a Thursday uprising by security forces who attacked military and police bases across the Ivory Coast, trying to oust the president while he was visiting Italy. The Cabinet minister in charge of police was killed along with the former junta leader accused of having a role in the uprising.

President Laurent Gbagbo declared the rebellion had been halted after hours of heavy gunfights and mortar exchanges left at least 10 rebel soldiers and seven loyal police dead. Bloody bodies littered the streets of Abidjan, the commercial capital.

Gbagbo’s government has been struggling to calm ethnic and political tension and a restive military since the once-tranquil country’s first-ever coup in 1999.

Government troops killed Gen. Robert Guei, the ex-junta leader, when his car refused to stop for a roadblock in downtown Abidjan, paramilitary police Sgt. Ahossi Aime said.

Guei, the former army chief who took power in the 1999 uprising, was forced out during elections the next year amid allegations he was trying to steal the vote.

Interior Minister Emile Boga Doudou apparently was killed in a rebel attack on his residence in which two guards were injured, police said.

In Rome, presidential aide Toussaint Alain said it was evident the former junta chief had played a role in the coup attempt. “Do you think Guei was on the battlefield going shopping?” Alain asked.

Defense Minister Lida Moise Kouassi announced the coup had collapsed in a television broadcast.

“Loyalist forces have come out on top,” President Laurent Gbagbo said in a statement from Rome, where he announced he was cutting short his visit.