Mali junta faces sanctions

West Africa's regional bloc has given the leaders of last week's coup in Mali three days to hand back power to an elected government or face diplomatic and financial isolation.

In a bid to force the military from power, a delegation of five African heads of state from the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) held an emergency meeting in Ivory Coast on Thursday, where they agreed on a series of crippling economic sanctions.

ECOWAS President Desire Kadre Ouedraogo told reporters that the 15-nation bloc planned to close all its borders with landlocked Mali as well prohibit Malian traders from using its ports. It would also freeze funding from the regional central bank if constitutional order wasn't restored to the nation within 72 hours.

The financial sanctions are among the harshest imposed on a nation in West Africa in recent years and are likely to strangle impoverished Mali where tensions on the ground are building rapidly.

Earlier on Thursday the planes carrying the five delegates, who had been scheduled to meet the coup leaders in Mali's capital, Bamako, were diverted to Ivory Coast after dozens of pro-coup demonstrators blocked the main runway at the airport.

Clashes were also reported in the capital between pro- and anti-coup demonstrators, seriously injuring three people.

Battle for the north

Democratically-elected President Amadou Toumani Toure was ousted from power last Wednesday by mutinous soldiers, dissatisfied with the government's handling of an uprising in the north of the country. The soldiers who led the attack said Toure had not responded forcefully to the Tuareg rebellions, and troops were left ill-equipped to fight the separatist insurgency movement.

Led by Captain Amadou Sanogo, they have since attempted to consolidate power and released a 69-article constitution, which was welcomed by thousands of pro-coup demonstrators in Bamako on Wednesday.

The battle in the north rages on, however, as Tuareg fighters attempt to strengthen their hold on the remote region. Insurgents reportedly attacked the key town of Kidal on Thursday, using shells, rockets and gunfire.

Kidal would be a major prize for the rebels, who re-launched their decades-old fight two months ago when many Tuareg returned heavily armed to Mali, having fought in Libya on the side of slain leader Moammar Gadhafi.

ccp/ncy (AFP, Reuters, AP)