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Dar-es-Salaam: The African Union will suspend Mauritania until democracy is restored in the West African nation following the military coup this week, AU chair Tanzania said on Saturday.
"African Union will suspend Mauritania until the country returns to a constitutional government," Tanzanian Foreign Affairs Minister Bernard Membe said in a statement on behalf of the continental organization.
His statement said Mauritania had signed up to several AU conventions that prohibit unconstitutional changes of government, including one that it ratified last month: the African Charter for Democracy, Elections and Governance.
Soldiers led by the presidential guard overthrew Sidi Mohamad Ould Cheikh Abdallahi, the country's first democratically elected president since independence in 1974, on Wednesday after he tried to sack senior officers.
The country's new leaders, led by presidential guard chief Mohammad Ould Abdel Aziz, said on Friday they would appoint a new government to run the country until new elections.
But condemnation of the coup has been widespread and Washington has frozen all non-humanitarian aid to the country, which is also one of the continent's newest oil producers.
An Arab League team met the coup leader on Saturday and Ahmad Ben Hilli, the organisation's assistant secretary general for political affairs, said he had been given reassurances of a return to democracy but no date for polls.
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