"The Ivorian army asked for, and was granted, permission to transport its planes from (the capital) Yamoussoukro to Abidjan," Hamadoun Toure, spokesman for the mission, known by its French acronym ONUCI, told AFP.

"That does not, to our mind, mean permission to repair the planes -- only the UN Security Council has the authority to make those decisions."

The four Russian-built Sukhoi-25 fighter bombers, along with several helicopters, were destroyed November 6 by French forces hours after an Ivorian air force strike on a French military base killed nine French peacekeepers and a US civilian aid worker.

Toure's remarks seemed a reversal from his statements Saturday, echoed by the French peacekeeping operation in the west African state, that permission had been granted for the repairs to the modest fleet.

"It involves restoring them to flying condition, repairing the damaged planes, not rearming them," Toure had said then.

One of the Russian-built Mi-24 helicopter gunships made several test flights over Yamoussoukro at the weekend, circling at low altitude to the delight of civilians on the ground.

A British Aerospace Strikemaster ground-attack aircraft also took off from Yamoussoukro on both days, ONUCI said.

Two more Sukhois remained grounded on Yamoussoukro's runway on Saturday, to be transported by road to Abidjan, and it was not clear how many were repairable.

The UN Security Council on November 15 imposed a 13-month ban on arms sales to all the protagonists in the conflict in the world's top cocoa producer.

France's 4,000-strong Operation Unicorn have been keeping the two sides apart in Ivory Coast since shortly after a failed coup by renegade troops against Gbagbo in September 2002 split the country in two.

ONUCI has deployed some 6,000 peacekeepers since April to bolster a flagging French-brokered peace pact but has failed to soothe tensions and reconcile the divided state, evoking fears that elections set for October this year will not be held as planned.

All rights reserved. � 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse.