The president and prime minister of Mauritania, in north-west Africa, have been taken into custody by soldiers in an apparent military coup. President Sidi Ould Cheikh Abdallahi and Prime Minister Yahia Ould Ahmed El-Ouakef are being held by troops, French news agency AFP reports. Mauritania staged elections in June 2007, two years after a military coup. The country has been gripped by political crisis for a fortnight, after a vote of no confidence in the cabinet. On Tuesday, 48 MPs walked out of the ruling party. Earlier on Wednesday, President Abdallahi replaced several senior army officers. The first indications of a military coup came as state television was taken off the air amid reports of unusual troop movements in the capital, Nouakchott. The president's daughter, Amal Mint Cheikh Abdallahi, told Reuters news agency soldiers seized her father at his house at 0920 local time (0920 GMT). Political instability Mauritania is one of the world's poorest nations as well as its newest oil producer. The desert nation, a former French colony of more than three million people, has been looking to oil revenues to boost its economy. Presidential elections held in 2007 ended a two-year period of military rule - the product of an earlier coup in 2005. The elections were deemed to have been free and fair and appeared to herald a new era of democracy. Earlier this year, however, the president dismissed the government amid protests over soaring food prices. The cabinet that replaced it has been dogged by instability, lacking the support of a moderate Islamist party and a major opposition group that were in the former government. Source: BBC