Buy the article on CAIRN websiteRésumé

The coup d'etat (August 3, 2005) overthrew Maaouya Ould Sid' Ahmed Taya (1984-2005), whose internal management (fallen through democratic turning) and choices of foreign politics (bringing together with the United States and fights at their side against international terrorism...) had made very unpopular. The new transition authority, directed by colonel Ely Ould Mohamed Vall, will undoubtedly not inflect these main axes: fight against international terrorism, problem of the Western Sahara. It will have to act quickly on two files intern alarming: the question of the refugees and the control of the economic capacity by some 'oligarchical' groups. Failing this, functioning today with the same men, it will quickly be regarded as the new preparing of an unchanged mode.

Alain Antil, Doctor in Political Geography, is a Associated Researcher at Ifri, Specialist in Sahelian and West Africa. He is currently part-time Lecturer at the Institut d'études politiques (IEP) of Lille. Alain Antil is the Author of the report of the International Crisis Group (ICG), The Islamist Challenge in Mauritania: Threat or Scapegoat? (2005).