Ivory Coast strongman Gbagbo offered U.S. professorship to end crisis -- No, really, they want him to teach to America's youth

Laurent Gbagbo was offered the chance to teach at Boston University in the United States if he would renounce his claim to be president of Ivory Coast and end the country's civil war, sources familiar with the negotiations told CNN Tuesday.

The United States gave permission for him to lecture at the university and teach anywhere else in the country as a visiting professor, a senior African diplomat told CNN Tuesday.

Boston University, which has a center for the study of African presidential politics, denied that it ever made an offer to give Gbagbo a position.

African Presidential Archives and Research Center "positions are designated for former heads of state that leave a country in a democratic fashion," said university spokesman Tom Testa, saying it was "never even a consideration."

But a senior American diplomat confirmed that a Boston University position had been part of the offer, and a spokesman for U.S. Senator James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican and friend of Gbagbo, said the State Department had asked him to ask if the self-declared president would accept a position there. (read more)