Gunmen attack palace in Equatorial Guinea
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Residents said government forces used a helicopter gunship to repulse the pre-dawn attack. The former Spanish colony has suffered decades of instability and in 2004 dozens of foreign mercenaries, mostly South Africans, were caught trying to overthrow the president.
President Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo was in Bata, in the part of Equatorial Guinea on mainland Africa, the Spanish state news agency EFE and a source in Malabo said. Although the government said the gunmen had tried to seize the presidential palace, Spain’s Foreign Ministry said the attack appeared to be criminal in nature, rather than an attempted coup d’état.
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