According to officials, João Bernardo Vieira, the president of Guinea-Bissau, was shot to death on Monday in his palace by renegade soldiers. "President Vieira was killed by the army as he tried to flee his house which was being attacked by a group of soldiers close to the chief of staff Tagme Na Waie, early this morning," Zamora Induta, a military spokesman, said to Agence France-Presse, insisting that "this was not a coup d'etat."