Battle rages in apparent Mauritania coup bid

STREET battles raged through Mauritania’s capital yesterday in an apparent coup against a pro-Israel president who has cracked down on Islamists, and residents said rebel soldiers had entered his office.

Heavy gunfire continued around the city centre as a column of smoke rose into the sky above the president’s palace.

It was the most serious threat President Maaouya Ould Sid’Ahmed Taya has faced since taking power in a 1984 coup.

Residents near the palace said dissident troops moved into Taya’s office after his guards fled.

“The soldiers told us they could not hold out any longer,” said one resident a few hundred yards away.

State radio had earlier announced that Taya was back in full control and appealed on people to be calm, but it stopped broadcasting about 45 minutes later.

Sources close to the president of the sparsely populated Sahara desert state, which straddles black and Arab Africa, said Taya had been in a safe place with his family since fighting erupted around 1:45am.

Residents said they believed the uprising had been staged by young

Islamist officers from an armoured unit and the air force. A plane circled briefly over the city centre, drawing fire from the ground, but it was not clear whose side it was on.

“Dozens of people have been wounded and the hospitals are doing the best to cope,” said one resident.

Hundreds of prisoners escaped from the central prison after their guards disappeared in the chaos.

Tensions have been bubbling in the almost exclusively Muslim country since the US-led war on Iraq.

The government has cracked down on suspected Islamists and politicians close to ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.

Thirty-two Islamic leaders were charged this month with threatening national security. Police sources said they were suspected of links to a foreign network of Islamic extremists. The charges made no reference to that.

There is widespread displeasure in Mauritania at Taya’s longstanding ties with Israel, which are as close as those of any Arab leader.

In 1999, Mauritania became only the third Arab League state to establish full diplomatic relations with the Jewish state.

Israel has given Mauritania help with agriculture and is also building a new hospital. Diplomats have said that the Israelis also provide discrete assistance with security.