“I strongly condemn the arrest of President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita, the Prime Minister and other members of the Malian Government and call for their immediate release,” Mahamat wrote.
He added that he called on “the mutineers to cease all use of violence,” and asked the international community to oppose any use of force.
Earlier on Tueday, Malian Prime Minister Cisse had posted a plea to troops on Facebook, asking the military to put down its arms and engage in dialogue.
“The government calls for reason and a patriotic sense and asks for the use of arms to be stopped. There are no problems that cannot be solved in dialogue,” Mali’s prime minister wrote, in a statement that appears to have been posted before his reported detention.
On Tuesday, crowds took to the streets in Bamako, surrounding the capital city’s independence monument. A building owned by Mali’s Minister of Justice was set on fire and looted.
The unrest in Mali’s capital followed reports of an attempted mutiny Tuesday morning at a military camp 15 km outside of the city, confirmed to CNN by a diplomatic source who had been briefed by local officials. The source spoke on the condition of anonymity, as they were not authorized to speak on the subject.