Police has arrested Mauritania’s former president Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz on the eve of his trial for abuse of power and amassing an illicit fortune, according to a lawyer.
The rare prosecution of a former African head of state was due to open on Wednesday morning, with Abdel Aziz spending the night in custody but he evaded arrest.
The ex-general came to power in a coup and spent 11 years at the helm. He stepped down in 2019 after two presidential terms in which he defused a jihadist insurgency threatening the conservative West African state.
