Blinken calls for immediate release of Bazoum

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Thursday called for the immediate release of Niger President Mohamed Bazoum.

Bazoum has been removed from power, according to a group of soldiers who appeared on the West African nation’s national television late on Wednesday, hours after the president was held in the presidential palace.

Blinken told a news conference in the New Zealand capital Wellington that “whether this constitutes a coup technically or not, I can’t say, that’s for the lawyers to say.

“however, what it clearly constitutes is an effort to seize power by force and to disrupt the constitution.’’

Blinken, therefore, called for Bazoum’s immediate release.

Reuters/NAN