NOUAKCHOTT (Reuters) - Mauritania's military junta on Sunday freed from house arrest ousted President Sidi Mohamed Ould Cheikh Abdallahi, who vowed to fight to return to the office he lost in a bloodless coup in August.

The generals who overthrew Abdallahi, the first democratically elected president of the west Saharan Islamic state, had said this month they would release him as part of negotiations to head off threatened European Union sanctions.