Mali’s president was forced to dissolve the country’s parliament and government late on Tuesday evening after mutinous soldiers stormed through the capital Bamako and arrested the president, his prime minister and many other top officials at gunpoint.
A military junta called the National Committee for the Salvation of the People (CNSP) is now in command of the beleaguered West African nation, which is already buckling under the strain of jihadist bombs and machete-wielding ethnic militias.
In a short address on national television last night, President Ibrahim Boubakar Keïta resigned wearing a blue surgical mask.
A few hours after Mr Keïta’s address, the junta made its first public appearance. Ismael Wague, the Air Force deputy chief of staff, read the statement on behalf of the junta on national television as four other soldiers in uniform looked on in a plain white room.
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