NEWS: Burkina Faso president resigns on condition to get security guarantee from military coup leader

Burk­i­na Faso’s self-pro­claimed mil­i­tary leader, Cap­tain Ibrahim Tra­oré, has accept­ed a con­di­tion­al res­ig­na­tion offered by Pres­i­dent Paul-Hen­ri Dami­ba to pre­vent fur­ther vio­lence after Fri­day’s coup, reli­gious and tra­di­tion­al lead­ers said. announced on Sunday.

Accord­ing to the agree­ment, which was announced at a press con­fer­ence, Tra­oré agreed to sev­en con­di­tions, includ­ing guar­an­tee­ing the safe­ty of Dami­va and the sol­diers who sup­port­ed him.

He also agreed to ful­fill a promise with the West African Region to return Burk­i­na Faso to con­sti­tu­tion­al­ism by July 2024.

Dami­ba could not be reached for com­ment. He left the coun­try on Sun­day, his rel­a­tives told Reuters.

Tra­oré ear­li­er said order was being restored after vio­lent protests against the French embassy and days of clash­es in which his fac­tion sought to over­throw the government.

There are also divi­sions with­in the mil­i­tary, with many sol­diers like­ly seek­ing help from Rus­sia as the influ­ence of for­mer colo­nial ruler France wanes.

At least three oth­er videos shared online on Sat­ur­day and Sun­day showed sol­diers on top of armored per­son­nel car­ri­ers wav­ing Russ­ian flags while the sur­round­ing crowd shout­ed “Rus­sia!” it was pro­ject­ed. Rus­sia! ”. Reuters did not ver­i­fy the footage.

Tra­oré’s team urged the pro­test­ers to stop attack­ing the French embassy, ​​the tar­get of the protests, after offi­cials said France had evac­u­at­ed the Dami­ba to French mil­i­tary bases in West Africa and was plan­ning a coun­terof­fen­sive. urged people.

France’s for­eign min­istry denied that the base was hid­ing Dami­ba after he was deport­ed on Fri­day. Dami­ba also denied he was at the base and said the report was a delib­er­ate manip­u­la­tion of pub­lic opinion.

“We want to let the pub­lic know that the sit­u­a­tion is under con­trol and order is being restored,” he said in a state­ment broad­cast on state television.

A sep­a­rate state­ment said Tra­oré would con­tin­ue to serve as pres­i­dent until a civil­ian or mil­i­tary inter­im pres­i­dent was appoint­ed in the com­ing weeks.

Oua­gadougou has seen spo­radic gun­fights since Sat­ur­day, but calmed down on Sunday.

An offi­cer loy­al to Tra­oré urged res­i­dents to keep calm, say­ing: “We urge them to con­tin­ue their activ­i­ties and refrain from any acts of vio­lence and van­dal­ism, espe­cial­ly against the French embassy and French mil­i­tary bases.” .

For­mer pres­i­dent Dami­ba launched a coup ear­li­er this year against a civil­ian gov­ern­ment that has fall­en out of favor as Islam­ic extrem­ist vio­lence esca­lates. The Dami­va’s inabil­i­ty to stop the mil­i­tants angered the mil­i­tary ranks of the for­mer French protectorate.

There are also divi­sions with­in the mil­i­tary over whether to seek help from oth­er inter­na­tion­al part­ners to fight militants.

The sol­diers who oust­ed Dami­ba said the for­mer leader, who they helped take over in Jan­u­ary, had aban­doned plans to find oth­er partners.

They did not name part­ners, but say observers and sup­port­ers want a clos­er part­ner­ship with Rus­sia, sim­i­lar to the sol­diers who took pow­er in neigh­bor­ing Mali in August 2020. there is

Hun­dreds of peo­ple, some wav­ing Russ­ian flags and sup­port­ing Tra­oré’s takeover, gath­ered in front of the French embassy on Sat­ur­day and Sun­day, throw­ing stones and burn­ing tires and debris.

“We want to coop­er­ate with Rus­sia. We want Dami­ba and France to leave,” said Arasan Thiem­tor, one of the protesters.

Anti-French demon­stra­tors also gath­ered and threw stones at the French Cul­tur­al Cen­ter in the south­ern town of Bobo Dura­so. French busi­ness­men were also destroyed on Sun­day morning.

Burk­i­na Faso has become the epi­cen­ter of attacks by groups linked to al-Qae­da and the Islam­ic State after vio­lence that began in neigh­bor­ing Mali in 2012 spread to oth­er sub-Saha­ran countries.

Attacks on rur­al com­mu­ni­ties have killed thou­sands and dis­placed mil­lions, despite Damiba’s pub­lic promise to tack­le inse­cu­ri­ty after the Jan­u­ary coup.

At least 11 sol­diers were killed in attacks in north­ern Burk­i­na Faso this week. Dozens of civil­ians are miss­ing in the after­math of the attack.