Mali's president resigns

ROUGH CUT - NO REPORTER NARRATION

Malian President Amadou Toumani Toure handed in his letter of resignation to ECOWAS on Sunday (April 8), paving the the way for the soldiers who ousted him in a coup to stand aside as pledged in a deal last week.

Power will now be transferred to the president of Mali's National Assembly.

According to the agreement signed with mediators, the junta must now make way for a unity government with Mali's parliament speaker Diouncounda Traore as interim president.

"I think the decision taken by ECOWAS and the international community is the best. It's necessary that Mali continues in the provisions of its constitution of February 1992. As a consequence, I think it's normal and I do it without any pressure at all and I do it in good faith and most of all for the love I have for this country. I have decided to present you with the letter of my resignation that you should present to the relevant authorities to allow the plan and full exercise of the provision of our article 36 (of the constitution)," Toure said.

It is not clear when elections, which had been due on April 29, will be held as the north is now in the hands of a mix of separatist Tuareg-led MNLA rebels and Islamist fighters seeking to impose sharia, Islamic law, across Mali.