er ombudsman, will facilitate the pursuit of talks initiated by the ECOWAS mediator Blaise Compaor4 with the Tuareg rebels of MNLA and the Islamist Ansar Dine. However, the conditions of the previous prime minister's departure, as well as the presence of the armed forces in the new government, are worrying

f ousted President Toure in Bamako. Pro-junta protesters storm presidential compound and beat Mr Traore unconscious. The Tuareg MNLA and Islamist Ansar Dine rebel groups merge and declare northern Mali to be an Islamic state. Ansar Dine begins to impose Islamic law in Timbuktu. AI-Qaeda in North Africa

President Blaise Compaore of Burkina Faso, Algeria and the UN through its Office for West Africa, time to attempt mediation efforts. Contacts with Ansar Dine, one of the Islamist groups in northern Mali, and with the secular Tuareg rebellion National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad (MNLA), are unde