Mali Prime Minister resigns after being arrested

PanARMENIAN.Net - The prime minister of Mali has resigned on state television, hours after being arrested by soldiers who were behind a military coup in March, BBC News reported.

Cheik Modibo Diarra was detained on Monday, Dec 10, at his home in the capital Bamako, presumably on the orders of the coup leader, Capt Amadou Sanogo.

He had been due to travel to France.

Diarra was made prime minister of an interim government in April after the military officially handed power back to civilians. The 60-year-old astrophysicist has backed plans to send a West African intervention force into the northern half of Mali which was seized after the coup by Islamists and Tuareg separatists.

But tensions between the soldiers who led the coup and the civilian prime minister they were forced to appoint have been mounting in recent weeks.

Many within Mali's military are opposed to foreign intervention, saying they need only financial and logistical support.

Military spokesman Bakary Mariko said that the prime minister was suspected of attempting to jeopardize the planned political dialogue over the transition to democracy.

"Eight months ago the prime minister was given the mission to help Mali recover its territorial integrity, but unfortunately he has been working to stay in power indefinitely," he said.

Diarra would be held until a new prime minister was appointed by the interim president, the spokesman said.

In his address on national broadcaster ORTM, Diarra gave no clear explanation of his resignation. "Men and women who are worried about the future of our nation, you are hoping for peace. It's for this reason that I, Cheikh Modibo Diarra, am resigning along with my entire government."

A member of the president's entourage earlier said that the prime minister had been arrested by about 20 soldiers from the sprawling Kati military base where the March 21coup was launched.

The source said soldiers had: "smashed in the door of the prime minister's residence and took him away a bit violently".

"They said Captain Sanogo sent them to arrest him," he added.

Security officials said Diarra was then driven to Kati.

The military spokesman told Reuters that Mr Diarra "wanted to leave the country having incited trouble".