Coup
Troops overthrow president in Mauritania coup
1 hour, 45 minutes ago
NOUAKCHOTT (AFP) - Troops overthrew Mauritania's president in a military coup on Wednesday after he tried to sack senior army officers accused of being behind a political crisis destabilising the country.
President Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi was arrested after military convoys rolled through the capital Nouakchott and took over the presidential palace and the prime minister's office, apparently without a shot being fired.
Soldiers also took over the national radio and television headquarters, chasing staff from the building, and shut down the international airport.
A statement read on public radio later said General Ould Abdel Aziz, the head of the presidential guard sacked that morning, was leading the coup.
A newly constituted Military State Council said it was immediately annulling the army appointments made by the president.
"The president has just been arrested by a commando, who came to fetch him, arrested him here and took him away," the president's daughter, Amal Mint Cheikh Abdallahi, told Radio France International from the palace.
"This is a real coup d'etat," she said.
Abdallahi said armed men had occupied the presidency and that she was being prevented from leaving the building, but that she had not heard shots fired.
The president's whereabouts were unknown, while Prime Minister Yahya Ould Ahmed Waghf was taken to an army barracks near the presidency, security sources said.
"The airport is closed, I think it will stay that way for a while until the new authorities get organised," said a security source on condition of anonymity.
Borders and international telephone communications remained open, however.
The European Union and African Union led international condemnation of the coup, with Brussels saying the move jeopardised a 156 million euro (241 million dollar) five-year aid package currently being finalised.
The Brussels-based bloc said the coup imperilled "the exemplary democratic advances which the country has made since the 2005 coup d'etat."
The AU said it was dispatching Ramtane Lamamra, its peace and security commissioner, to "assess the situation on the ground and to assist in promoting a peaceful solution to the crisis."
Condemnation also came from regional powerhouses South Africa and Nigeria.
Police fired tear gas grenades to disperse a crowd of about 50 people gathered near one of the main markets during the afternoon, local journalists reported, but the capital of the nation of 3.1 million people was otherwise calm.
A spokesman for the ousted president told AFP the coup was in response to the earlier presidential decree sacking the officers.
"These officers, three generals, refused to accept the presidential decree and are rebelling against the constitutional order," the spokesman Abdoulaye Mahmadou Ba said.
The coup came 15 months after Abdallahi came to power in elections hailed as a model of democracy for Africa, following a three-year transition after a bloodless coup in August 2005.
Mauritania has been facing a political crisis and on Monday 48 MPs walked out on the ruling party less than two weeks after a vote of no confidence in the government prompted a cabinet reshuffle.
Renegade lawmakers criticised Abdallahi's exercise of "personal power", adding that he had "disappointed the hopes of Mauritanians," a spokesman for the group said on Monday.
Coup leader Abdel Aziz and another general, army chief-of-staff Ould Cheikh Mohamed Ahmed, were accused of being behind the mass walkout, political observers in the capital said.
The breakaway MPs said they will form a new party to seek a change of direction in the country, which imports more than 70 percent of its food and has been hard hit by the global food crisis.
The Mauritanian president last month threatened to dissolve parliament after MPs filed a motion of no confidence in his new government, which then resigned.
A spokesman for the rebel MPs said the president was "reaping the fruits of his bad decisions".
The largely desertified country has a history of coups since gaining independence from France in 1960.
Mauritania was shaken between December 2007 and February 2008 by three attacks by extremists linked to Al-Qaeda which left seven people dead including four French tourists.
The attacks caused the organisers of the 2008 Dakar rally to cancel the race, which usually crosses the Mauritanian deserts.
