Algerian president Bouteflika resigns

Algeria's President Abdelaziz Bouteflika has submitted his resignation, state news agency APS said yesterday, following weeks of mass protests against his rule.

The ailing, 82-year-old leader stood down shortly after the army chief of staff demanded immediate action to remove him from office.

"There is no more room to waste time," state news agency APS quoted Lieutenant General Ahmed Gaed Salah as saying.

On Monday, Bouteflika, who was in power for 20 years, had said he would quit before the end of his term on April 28.

But a protest leader and opposition parties rejected this as insufficient, while hundreds of students marched through the capital Algiers to demand to replacement of a political system widely seen as incapable of significant reform.

Bouteflika, a veteran of Algeria's war for independence, has rarely seen in public since he suffered a stroke in 2013.

He had sought to fend off the wave of dissent against his two-decade-old rule that began on February 22 by reversing his decision to seek a fifth term. But he did not say when he would go, further angering protesters.