Mohamed Bazoum deposed president facing high treason charge

This is the latest sign that the junta intends to resist international pressure to return power to Mr Bazoum.

The West African regional bloc Ecowas said it was shocked to learn that the junta wanted to prosecute him.

He has been held in the basement of his palace since the military staged a coup about three weeks ago.

Mr Bazoum was in "good spirits" despite being held in "difficult" conditions, his doctor said after a visit.

Saturday's visit was approved amid growing international demands for Mr Bazoum's release.

The US State Department expressed its dismay that the Niger leader had been charged, with spokesperson Vedant Patel describing the charges as "completely unwarranted and unjustified".

Mr Patel said they would not "contribute to a peaceful resolution of this crisis", and said they were a "further affront, in our opinion, to democracy and justice and to the respect of the rule of law."

Spokesman Colonel Major Amadou Abdramane said on state television on Sunday night the military regime had "gathered the necessary evidence to prosecute before competent national and international authorities the ousted president and his local and foreign accomplices for high treason and for undermining the internal and external security of Niger".

The African Union, the European Union, the United States and the United Nations have all said they are worried about the conditions in which Mr Bazoum is being kept.

Mr Mohamed Bazoum is currently under house arrest with his wife and son in the presidential compound. 

Mr Bazoum's political party has said his family has no access to running water, fresh food or doctors, and Mr Bazoum has told Human Rights Watch that his son needs to see a doctor because of a serious heart condition.

But the junta said on Sunday that Mr Bazoum was regularly seeing his doctor and the last visit was on August 12. 

"After this visit the doctor raised no concerns about the state of health of the ousted president and members of his family," Colonel Abdramane said. 

Mr Bazoum’s government had worked closely with the US and the European Union to tackle jihadist militants in the region and to stem the flow of migrants heading north toward the Mediterranean.

The US, France, Germany and Italy all have troops stationed in the country, in a region where local affiliates of al Qaeda and Islamic State have killed thousands and displaced millions.

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Sarah H 

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