Elite Guinea Army Unit Kicks Out President

Special forces soldiers appeared Sunday to have ousted Guinea's long-serving president, telling the nation they had dissolved its government and constitution and closed its land and air borders, Saliou Samb reported for Reuters.

Photo Insert: Ousted President Alpha Conde

As the United Nations (UN) condemned any takeover by force and the West African region's economic bloc threatened reprisals, the elite army unit's head, Mamady Doumbouya, said "poverty and endemic corruption" had driven his forces to remove President Alpha Conde from office.

"We have dissolved government and institutions," Doumbouya - a former French foreign legionnaire - said on state television, draped in Guinea's national flag and surrounded by eight other armed soldiers.

"We are going to rewrite a constitution together."

Gunfire erupted near the presidential palace in the capital, Conakry, on Sunday morning. Hours later, videos shared on social media, which Reuters could not immediately authenticate, showed Conde in a room surrounded by army special forces.

Military sources said the president was taken to an undisclosed location and that the forces commanded by Doumbouya - who one of the sources, a close colleague, described as calm and reserved by nature - had made several other arrests.

They included senior government officials, the sources said. Guinea's main opposition leader, Cellou Dalein Diallo, denied rumors that he was among those detained.

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