Burkina Faso Army Detains Interim President, Prime Minister Despite Massive

Soldiers from Burkina Faso’s powerful presidential guard interrupted a cabinet meeting on Wednesday and detained the ministers, the prime minister and interim President Michel Kafando, military sources said.

The warning shots, fired by unidentified soldiers as night fell on the capital, caused the crowd to retreat slightly but not to disperse.

“It is the whole of the government, including the prime minister and the president, taken by a group of soldiers from the presidential guard”, said one senior military source.

Achille Tapsoba, who works at the presidency, told The Associated Press that the military arrived and was preventing the president and prime minister from leaving.

The head of Burkina Faso’s Transitional National Council, Cherif Sy, condemned the takeover. “I call on all patriots to gather to defend the motherland, ” he added.

News of the standoff Wednesday created panic in Burkina Faso’s capital of Ouagadougou, where people closed shops early and headed home fearing violent demonstrations.

AFP reports that members of Compaore’s Presidential Security Regiment (RSP) “burst into the cabinet room at 2:30 pm and kidnapped the president of Burkina Faso Michel Kafando and Prime Minister Isaac Zida, and two ministers (Augustin Loada and Rene Bagoro)”, interim parliament speaker, Moumina Cheriff Sy said in a statement sent to AFP.

But there have been tensions over the vote because members of Compaore’s party have been declared ineligible.

On Monday the country’s National Reconciliation and Reforms Commission recommended that the 1,300-man security force, considered the country’s best troops, be disbanded.

Kafando was chosen interim president in October after the ousting of Blaise Compaore.