In a video shot at the presidential headquarters, government spokesperson Abderaman Koulamallah said the situation was completely under control, without giving details on what had happened.

"It was a little incident ... everything is calm," he said in the footage posted on Facebook. "This whole attempt at destabilisation has been thwarted."

Wednesday's events coincided with an official visit by China Foreign Minister Wang Yi to Chad, which recently ended a defence cooperation pact with longtime partner France that had made it a key Western ally in the fight against Islamic militants in West and Central Africa's troubled Sahel region.

--Reuters--