Mali's interim President headed to Ghana to take part in ECOWAS Summit: Presidency

Mali's newly-appointed interim President Colonel Assimi Goita has departed for Ghana where he will participate in a summit of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) on Sunday, the presidency informs.

Rabat [Morocco], May 30 (ANI/Sputnik): Mali's newly-appointed interim President Colonel Assimi Goita has departed for Ghana where he will participate in a summit of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) on Sunday, the presidency informs. "The President of the Transition, Colonel Assimi GOITA, Head of State, left Bamako this Saturday, May 29, 2021 for Accra in Ghana where he will take part alongside his counterparts in the sub-region in the 'Extraordinary ECOWAS Summit on the situation in Mali', scheduled for this Sunday, May 30, 2021," the presidency said in a statement, released on Facebook.

Goita is expected to hold one-on-one talks with his Ghanaian counterpart Nana Akufo-Addo and will also hold a series of bilateral meetings. On Friday, Mali's constitutional court named Col. Assimi Goita, who had been vice president, as the country's new interim leader.

Earlier in the week, a Sputnik source said that the military had arrested interim President Bah N'Daw and Prime Minister Moctar Ouane and transported them to the Kati military base near the capital of Bamako. According to the source, the presidential guard refused to protect the president, allowing the military to take him away. Goita said he had dismissed the president and prime minister for violating the Transitional Charter. A military source told Sputnik that Goita had informed ECOWAS that a military council would assume power in the country.

In August 2020, a group of Malian soldiers started a mutiny at the Kati base. Insurgents kidnapped several ministers and high-ranking military officials, including former President Ibrahim Boubakar Keita, who later dissolved the government and parliament. On September 12, the military approved the basic law and strategy for transition after consultations with political and civil figures. The parties agreed that the transition period would last eighteen months. Bah N'Daw, a former defense minister, was appointed as president for that period. (ANI/Sputnik)

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