International

The regional bloc of West African states has condemned what it called an attempted coup in Guinea-Bissau amid reports of soldiers seizing control of a central area of the country’s capital.

A United Nations team of 30 unarmed military observers is ready to deploy to Syria to begin a monitoring mission as soon as the Security Council approves its mission, a spokesman for special envoy Kofi Annan has said.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Friday everything had to be done to prevent a “terrorist or Islamic state” emerging in northern Mali after rebels seized vast tracts of the desert north.