20120708
AFP
Gambian President Yahya Jammeh has sacked his army chief of staff, the president's office has announced, two months after the other top officials were reassigned as deputy ambassadors to various countries.

General Masanneh Kinteh was replaced by his deputy, Ousman Badjie, the office said in a statement.

Intelligence agents questioned Kinteh last week, but no information filtered out from the session.

Jammeh, himself a former military officer, brooks no dissent in a country often blasted by rights bodies for torture, disappearances and arbitrary arrests.

In May, the heads of the army, air force, marines and presidential guard were relieved of their duties and appointed as deputy ambassadors.

Gambia is a sliver of land on west Africa's Atlantic coast flanked on both sides by Senegal.