ABIDJAN, Ivory Coast ? The United States sent a small military team Wednesday to conflict-torn Ivory Coast, and France announced it was increasing its force to more than 3,000 troops, amid often violent protests against a Paris-brokered peace accord.

In the latest of more than two weeks of protests, 10,000 government supporters massed in front of the French Embassy to vent their outrage at a French-brokered peace plan they say gives too much to rebels who control more than half the country.

The U.S. team of about 20 men, wearing bulletproof vests and a mix of uniforms and civilian clothes, arrived at Abidjan’s international airport in a U.S. Air Force transport plane.

A U.S. Embassy official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the men were a “military advisory team … in Abidjan to monitor the situation with us.”

Almost all Western nations have urged their citizens to leave Ivory Coast, where attacks on foreigners have mounted in the West African nation’s 4-month-old civil war.

Wednesday’s rally at the embassy was peaceful, with protesters mixing lyrics from reggae songs with anti-French slogans. “Chirac, assassin!” some cried, denouncing French President Jacques Chirac.

Stores and banks in the central business district barred their doors Wednesday for fear the rally would turn violent.

The deal, reached Jan. 24 in Paris after two weeks of talks, is meant to end the civil war in the world’s largest cocoa-producing nation. Loyalists are most angered by rebel claims that the peace deal gives them control of the Interior and Defense ministries — meaning control of the military and paramilitary police.

In Paris, army spokesman Col. Christian Baptiste said France was sending 450 soldiers this week to join more than 2,500 troops and 200 paramilitary police already in this former French colony.

France says its troops are in Ivory Coast to protect foreigners and try to uphold shaky cease-fires.

Demonstrators shout anti-French and pro-U.S. slogans outside the French Embassy in Abidjan, Ivory Coast. Wednesday's demonstrations against a French-brokered peace plan were among news that former colonial ruler France announced it was increasing its troops in the Ivory Coast.