Burundi army chief says coup attempt failed

Burundi's armed forces chief announced early Thursday that an attempted coup by a top general against President Pierre Nkurunziza had failed, although the claim was immediately denied by opponents of the central African nation's leader.

"The attempted coup by General Godefroid Niyombare has been stopped," armed forces chief General Prime Niyongabo said in a radio announcement.

The broadcast said the presidency and presidential palace were under control of the president's backers.

"The national defence force calls on the mutineers to give themselves up," he added in the broadcast on state radio, also under the control of forces loyal to the president.

However a spokesman for the anti-Nkurunziza camp, Burundi's police commissioner Venon Ndabaneze, said the claim was false and that his side was in control of facilities including Bujumbura's international airport.

"This message does not surprise us because the general has long been allied to the forces of evil and and lies," he told AFP.

He also insisted that pro-coup forces had not yet seized state radio only because they "wanted to avoid a bloodbath".

Niyombare, a former intelligence chief who was sacked earlier this year, announced via a private radio station on Wednesday that the president had been overthrown hours after he left for neighbouring Tanzania for regional talks.

The move capped weeks of violent protests against the leader's controversial bid to stand for a third term in upcoming elections, which the opposition and rights groups say is unconstitutional and contrary to a peace deal that ended a civil war in 2006.

The latest radio announcement and the denial signals that the outcome of the coup attempt remains uncertain, and that overnight negotiations within the armed forces -- which appears sharply divided over the issue -- may have failed.

There is also continued uncertainty over Nkurunziza's whereabouts.

The Tanzanian government said late Wednesday that he was flying back home, although there was speculation he may have been forced to turn around or travel to a third country elsewhere in the region.
Source: AFP