Comoros, 2000 — military coup attempt

Event Summary

The dataset records an event coded as an attempted military coupi in the Comoros on 21 March 2000 during the turbulent aftermath of the April 1999 coup in which Colonel Azali Assoumani had seized power. The Comoros, notorious for its decades of coups and mercenary intrigue, was in deep crisis: the island of Anjouan had declared secession from the archipelago in 1997, and Azali's takeover had come amid that separatist emergency and the collapse of the previous government. His new military regime was itself unstable, facing rivalries within the army, international pressure for a return to constitutional rule, and the unresolved Anjouan crisis.

A coup attempt or plot against Azali in March 2000 arose from that factional instability and did not unseat him. He weathered the challenge and eventually navigated a negotiated settlement, the 2001 Fomboni Accord, that reunited the islands under a new federal arrangement; Azali then won a contested 2002 election to become president of the reconstituted Union of the Comoros, converting his coup leadership into an elected office, and would remain a dominant, if controversial, figure in Comorian politics for years to come.