Mauritania coup plotters to appeal

[XXPANTHAXX]

Thursday 10 February 2005 1:35 PM GMT

Soldiers convicted of plotting coups in Mauritania will
appeal to the supreme court to quash their sentences because
of what they say were serious breaches of law during the mass
trial.

In a statement in Nouakchott late on Wednesday, the lawyers
said the court that tried the men was formed illegally, there
were flaws in police reports, and that many of the accused
had been tortured.

A total of 195 people, most from the military, went on trial
late last year in the vast coup-prone former French colony
which is hoping to get rich from offshore oil.

Four soldiers, including coup ringleader Salih Walad Hanina,
were sentenced to life in prison with hard labour at the
trial, which was held over 74 days at a military garrison
east of the Islamic republic's capital Nouakchott.

Guilt admission

"We have consequently decided ... to lodge an appeal so that
the supreme court can rule on the serious infringements of
the law noted during this trial and on this basis quash the
sentences against the condemned," the statement said.

"The judges gave no response to the denunciation of serious
torture exposed in detail by the majority of the accused who
were victims," it added.

Hanina pleaded guilty to a June 2003 attempted putsch, during
which he came close to toppling President Muawiya walad Sidi
Ahmad Taya during two days of fierce street fighting in
Nouakchott before loyalists regained control.

Mauritania's government says it has since foiled two more
coup attempts in 2004 by dissidents linked to Hanina.

Clampdown pretext

Critics say the two latest coup bids - for which the
government has also blamed Burkina Faso and Libya - were a
pretext to justify a clampdown on political opponents.

During the trial, three opposition politicians, including
former military ruler Muhammad Khuna, were acquitted on
charges of funding the coup attempts. The rest of the
defendants were sentenced to between one and 15 years.

Hanina was removed from the army after being accused of
stirring discontent over Mauritania's links with Israel.

The country is one of only three Arab League members to have
full relations with Israel.

Taya, who first seized power in a coup in 1984, has angered
many Arabs in a nation straddling black and Arab Africa by
shifting support over the past decade from former Iraqi
leader Saddam Hussein to Israel and the United States.