What next for Mali?

MALIANS ARE no strangers to coups d’état. In 1991 the armed forces stepped in after sustained protests against Moussa Traoré, the dictator who had ruled the west African country since 1968. (Traoré himself had led a coup against his predecessor.) In March 2012 mutinous soldiers angry at the government’s handling of a rebellion in the north ousted the president, Amadou Toumani Touré.The latest coup, on August 18th, has familiar echoes. It comes after months of protests. Like the events of 2012, it began with a mutiny at a base in Kati, a garrison town 15km (9 miles) outside the capital, Bamako. Soldiers arrested the president, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, who in a video later that day announced his resignation from behind a face mask. “Do I really have a choice?” he asked. “Because I do not wish blood to be shed.” A day later five members of the new junta announced on television that they want “a civil political transition”.