"Mali soldiers continue political arrests" April 18, 2012
BAMAKO,
Mali - Soldiers arrested the head of one of Mali’s biggest political
parties and officials from the country’s ousted government on Tuesday,
deepening questions about whether the military is still in control even
as a new civilian prime minister was appointed to the interim
government.
Cheick Modibo Diarra, a former NASA scientist who
served as Microsoft Corp.’s chairman for Africa until last year, is now
tasked with organizing new elections in Mali after last month’s coup.
His
nomination as prime minister follows the swearing in of an interim
president after the regional group ECOWAS pressured the junta leader,
Captain Amadou Sanogo, into signing an accord to eventually restore
civilian rule.
However,
Sanogo has made clear in numerous statements since the agreement that
he intends to continue to play an important role in Malian politics,
especially after the 40-day period the interim president has in office
under the terms of the constitution.
On Tuesday, soldiers detained
a number of senior politicians and military officials, including many
prominent in the government that was toppled last month by the junta.
The European Union delegation in Mali issued a statement expressing
concern about the arrests and calling for “an urgent clarification and
their immediate release.’’
“As soon as I heard I contacted Captain
Sanogo to tell him that’s not the sort of thing that should happen in a
country where there is the rule of law, and that he should take
measures so that those who have been detained know first of all why they
have been detained and that they should possibly be released,’’ interim
President Dioncounda Traore said.
“He promised me to look into the matter today,’’ Traore said.
The soft reaction shows the PTB support the coup.
Among
the detainees are a former prime minister, the general in charge of
former president Amadou Toumani Toure’s personal protection, and the
country’s former defense minister.
The president of one of Mali’s
biggest parties was also arrested. Soumaila Cisse was one of the
front-runners for the presidential election set for April 29 that was
derailed by the coup.
Hmmmmmmmmm!!!!
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Related: Wild West Africa
"Mali’s ousted leader flees to Senegal" New York Times, April 21, 2012
DAKAR, Senegal - The former president of Mali, ousted in a
military coup at the end of March, has arrived in Dakar, officials said
Friday, in flight from a country still in the grip of the soldiers who
forced him out.
Amadou Toumani Toure had been in hiding in a suburban district of
Mali’s capital, Bamako, for most of the period since the coup. On
Thursday night, according to Senegal officials, he left on a Senegalese
government plane with 17 family members and aides, arriving here in the
Senegalese capital. Senegal is the only country in the region to have
never known either a coup or a civil war.
Well, not yet anyway.
See: Senegal Spinning Out of Control
Haven't seen anything since.
Toure, until recently considered one of West Africa’s democratic
exemplars, was forced to flee his presidential palace in Bamako on March
22 after an attack by mutinous soldiers....
Toure is himself a former general. He first came to power in a 1991
coup and subsequently won several elections that were generally
considered free.
Well, live by the sword of CIA coup, die by the sword of CIA coup.
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