COTONOU: Several people died in Benin during a thwarted coup attempt on the weekend, the west African country’s government announced Monday after an emergency cabinet meeting.
Early Sunday, “violent clashes” erupted between the coup plotters and the Republican Guard at the Cotonou residence of President Patrice Talon, resulting in “casualties on both sides,” according to the government.
Among the dead was the wife of the president’s military chief-of-staff, General Bertin Bada, who was himself fatally wounded in a separate, earlier assault by the putschists.
Some coup plotters remained at large late Monday with as many as a dozen arrested.
“The small group of soldiers who organized the mutiny planned to remove the president of the republic from office, to subjugate the Republic’s institutions and to challenge the established order,” said the government’s secretary general, Edouard Ouin-Ouro, according to cabinet meeting minutes.
“They initially attempted to neutralize or kidnap certain generals and senior army officers,” he added.
The plotters, who staged their mutiny at the Togbin base in the capital according to the government, abducted Sunday night the chief of staff of the National Guard, Faizou Gomina, and also General Abou Issa, army chief of staff.
Both men were eventually released in Tchaourou, a central city located more than 350 km (215 miles) from Cotonou.
The army “surrounded the Togbin base” on Sunday, where “targeted, surgical airstrikes were then carried out, without exposing surrounding neighborhoods” to danger, the government said.
Benin says it received military assistance for the strikes from the Nigerian army and from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which announced the deployment of soldiers from four countries in the region.
Those troops are “currently housed” at the Togbin base, which “has been retaken,” according to Ouin-Ouro.
“This operation was carried out successfully, without loss of life,” and “the last attackers ... fled,” the government stated.
‘Several’ deaths in thwarted Benin coup: government
https://arab.news/c8hda
‘Several’ deaths in thwarted Benin coup: government
- Among the dead was the wife of the president’s military chief-of-staff, who was himself fatally wounded
- Some coup plotters remained at large late Monday with as many as a dozen arrested
Russia will examine Trump’s ‘Board of Peace’ invite: Putin
- Invites were sent to dozens of world leaders with a request for $1 billion for a permanent seat on the board
MOSCOW: President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday said Russia would study US President Donald Trump’s invitation to join his “Board of Peace.”
“The Russian foreign ministry has been charged with studying the documents that were sent to us and to consult on the topic with our strategic partners,” Putin said during a televised government meeting. “It is only after that we’ll be able to reply to the invitation.”
He said that Russia could pay the billion dollars being asked for permanent membership “from the Russian assets frozen under the previous American administration.”
He added that the assets could also be used “to reconstruct the territories damaged by the hostilities, after the conclusion of a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine.”
Invites were sent to dozens of world leaders with a request for $1 billion for a permanent seat on the board.
Although originally meant to oversee Gaza’s rebuilding, the board’s charter does not seem to limit its role to the Palestinian coastal enclave and appears to want to rival the United Nations, drawing the ire of some US allies including France.
