Lagos — Mutinous Guinean soldiers yesterday launched a coup by suspending the country's constitution hours after the death was announced of the country's President Lansana Conte.

But the Prime Minister Ahmed Tidiane Souare said the government was still intact even as the army chief, Gen. Diarra Camara, called the mutineers a minority.

The revolting soldiers broadcast a communiqué on state radio suspending the constitution and the government.

"I think they are in the minority ... they are not the majority in the army," Camara, told French TV station, France 24.

Officials said negotiations were held at the main Alpha Yaya Diallo military base in Conakry's suburbs, between soldiers and officers who supported the coup and those who wanted to stay loyal to constitutional procedure.

National Assembly President Aboubacar Sompare, who under the constitution should take over as interim head of state following Conte's death on Monday, told French TV an "attempted coup d'etat" was under way, Reuters reported.

Shots were heard from the neighbourhood of the Alpha Yaya Diallo camp, residents said. But despite the presence of heavily-armed military patrols, and at least one tank in the streets, the dilapidated seaside capital Conakry was calm.

"I don't think all of the army are behind the mutineers ... It's a group," Sompare told France 24, speaking from his home in the capital, Conakry.

The attempted coup was launched just hours after government leaders said Conte, 74, had died from illness following nearly a quarter century of rule over the country, the world's leading exporter of bauxite aluminium ore.

In radio broadcasts, the soldiers attempting the coup told government leaders to go to the Alpha Yaya Diallo camp "for their protection," but Sompare said he and Souare were still at liberty.

Former colonial power, France, which holds the rotating European Union (EU) presidency, said it would oppose any coup in Guinea, a position echoed by the African Union (AU) and the West African regional bloc ECOWAS.