The African Union says Mali's President Amadou Toumani Toure is safe, a day after renegade soldiers announced they had toppled his government.

The head of the AU Commission, Jean Ping, told reporters Friday that the AU has received assurances Mr. Toure is at an undisclosed location near Bamako and is being protected by loyalists.

The AU suspended Mali's membership Friday at a meeting of its Peace and Security Council in Addis Ababa.

The African body has joined the U.N., United States, and European Union in condemning the coup, and the EU and World Bank have both suspended development aid to Mali.

The United States warned Friday it could suspend aid to Mali if democracy is not restored.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said humanitarian aid, which made up more than half of the $137 million in annual U.S. assistance to Mali will not be affected.

“Any US assistance to the government of Mali beyond what we give for humanitarian purposes is at risk if we cannot get back to a democratic situation in the country.”

Soldiers took control of Mali's presidential palace late Wednesday, after expressing anger at President Toure's handling of an ethnic Tuareg rebellion in the north.

The Tuareg rebels have said they will push to seize more government territory in the wake of the unrest.

A leader of the rebel MNLA told VOA that the rebels plan to advance toward areas held by the Malian army, including the towns of Kidal, Timbuktu, and Gao.

MNLA second-in-command Karim ag Matafa said the group wants to remove the government from what the rebels consider Tuareg land.

Our problem is not with a specific government, he says. Our problem is with the occupation of our country.

The coup took place just a few weeks before the president was due to step down at the end of his second term. Elections are scheduled for next month.

Sonny Ugoh, an official with regional bloc ECOWAS, told VOA Thursday the coup heightens insecurity in Mali. Ugoh said ECOWAS had been working with Mali's leaders to try to negotiate an end to the Tuareg uprising.

Well-armed Tuareg separatists started attacking army bases in Mali's desert in January, after many Tuareg fighters returned from Libya.

The United Nations refugee agency says the conflict has uprooted more than 190,000 people in and around Mali. Many soldiers have died in the conflict.

Tuareg nomads have launched periodic uprisings for greater autonomy in Mali and Niger.

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