Dozens of people have been killed and dozens injured, while hundreds are still being held hostage after a military coup attempt was thwarted in Benin, officials said on Tuesday.
Government officials in Benin confirmed that there had been multiple “casualties on both sides” after a coup attempt was foiled with the intervention of ECOWAS forces over the weekend. “The small group of army men who tried to overthrow the elected government and remove the President of the country from office, in a bid to establish a military order, was quelled with the African collective security forces on Monday,” said the government's Secretary General, Edouard Ouin-Ouro.
The plotters at first tried to kill or kidnap the senior military officers, such as army chief-of-staff General Abou Issa and National Guard chief-of-staff Faizou Gomina, who were abducted from the Togbin military base.
The Nigerian Air Force launched precision strikes on the Togbin base, where the majority of the defectors are believed to have been hiding. However, the whereabouts of the coup leader, Lieutenant Colonel Pascal Tigri, a former artillery officer and member of President Talon's protection detail, remain unknown, along with dozens of hostages.
President Talon on Sunday called the move a "senseless adventure" and warned that those responsible will face punishment. Early on Sunday morning, "violent clashes" had broken out between army defectors and government forces close to President Patrice Talon's residence in Cotonou, the economic capital of Benin.
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