Ex-head of Maldives rejects call for unity govt

MALE, Maldives - Ousted Maldives president Mohamed Nasheed on Sunday rejected a US call for compromise and dismissed proposals for a unity government to end political unrest in the Indian Ocean nation.

Nasheed, who insists he was removed in a coup, told supporters overnight in the capital Male that he would press for snap elections instead of recommending his party consider a coalition with his former deputy who succeeded him.

"We want an election and we will campaign for it," Nasheed told large, cheering crowds, who later dispersed peacefully.

Nasheed said his Maldivian Democratic Party (MDP) did not accept the new government as legitimate.

He also repeated his calls for an independent investigation into the alleged coup that toppled him and he accused the police and military of carrying out arrests of MDP supporters and those linked to his administration.

His remarks came after US Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian affairs Robert Blake spoke out against snap polls and asked both sides to make "compromise."

New Maldives President Mohamed Waheed Hussain Manik said on Saturday he was open to an inquiry into how he took office.

Diplomats from the United States, Britain, India, the United Nations and the Commonwealth have been pressing for an independent inquiry after former president Nasheed quit office on Tuesday.

"I have heard calls for an independent inquiry into the events that preceded my assumption of the presidency," said Waheed, who met Blake on Saturday. "I am open to those suggestions," he told reporters.

Nasheed says he was forced out at gunpoint by mutinying police and soldiers, while Waheed says Nasheed resigned freely.

On Friday Nasheed threatened mass street protests unless his successor stepped aside and handed power to the parliament speaker until new elections are held in two months. The next elections are due in October 2013. Nasheed remains free despite an arrest warrant against him, issued, he says, by the same judge he ordered the military to arrest on the grounds he was illegally blocking multi-million dollar graft cases.

The judge's Jan 16 arrest sparked three weeks of protests which culminated in Tuesday's mutiny of police and soldiers.

Maldives, a chain of 1,192 islands, is home to around 330,000 Sunni Muslims, and annually receives about three times as many visitors to its luxury resorts.

On Addu atoll, a southern island chain with 30,000 people, calm appeared to have returned after police retaliated against Nasheed supporters who rampaged and destroyed police stations and other government buildings.

Five people Reuters spoke to reported being assaulted by police and soldiers, and being detained for a few hours. Most bore bruises and visible signs of assault.

"My face was pushed into the ground, they walked on my back, pulled me up and I put my hands up and they began to beat me," said Muaz Haleem, a Nasheed supporter.

AP-Reuters