Guinea’s junta suspends negotiations on political crisis pending return of wounded leader

Guinea’s junta suspends political negotiations

CONAKRY, Guinea — Guinea’s military junta has suspended negotiations with the opposition on the country’s political crisis until the return of its wounded leader, a junta spokesman said Wednesday.

Minister of Communications Idrissa Cherif said that the talks meant to find a solution to the country’s political stalemate have not been canceled, but will be put on hold for the foreseeable future.

Discussions were underway in neighboring Burkina Faso and mediated by that country’s president following the massacre in September that human rights groups say killed at least 157 people.

“We cannot continue when our boss is not here … The negotiations have been suspended,” Cherif said. Asked when Capt. Moussa “Dadis” Camara will return to Guinea, he said: “I do not know when the president will come back. It’s up to his doctors.”

Camara who grabbed power in an army-led coup a year ago suffered a bullet wound to his head last week when his top aide opened fire on him during a heated argument. He was rushed to a military hospital in Morocco for emergency surgery Friday, where the state of his health has since remained a mystery. Junta officials have insisted that he is doing well and is conscious and talking, but diplomats briefed on the matter have repeatedly said that the military strongman was seriously wounded and is unlikely to return anytime soon.

The suspension of the high-level talks is another indication that the country’s leader is unlikely to be making a quick recovery. The talks mediated by Burkina Faso President Blaise Compaore were meant to find a solution to the country’s political impasse following the Sept. 28 massacre by military at a pro-democracy rally.

Camara, who suspended the country’s constitution when he grabbed power last year, had promised to organize elections within one year in which neither he nor any other member of the 32-person junta would be allowed to run. He broke his promise just a few months later.

When thousands of opposition supporters gathered inside the national stadium in September to demand his departure, the presidential guard opened fire. Dozens of women were brutally raped on the stadium grass, including with bayonets, knives and rifle barrels. Rape victims have testified before a U.N. commission that they saw top junta leaders walking past them as they were being assaulted and did nothing to stop the soldiers.

The shocking brutality prompted the African and the European Unions to impose sanctions, including an arms embargo and a travel ban on top members of the junta. Compaore offered to mediate between the military and civilian leaders in the Burkina Faso capital, Ouagadougou. The next meeting between the two sides was supposed to be around Dec. 17.

The suspension could indicate that the military government is leaderless, in contradiction to what the junta had earlier been saying. Cherif insisted that the president was talking and had met members of his cabinet in his hospital room in Morocco.

Diplomats in touch with medical officials in Morocco have said that Camara’s room inside the Mohammed V Hospital in Rabat is off limits to anyone other than his doctors and his nurse, and possibly his wife and children.