FACTBOX: Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf resigns

(Reuters) - Somali President Abdullahi Yusuf resigned on Monday, ending a deadlock at the top of the interim government in the anarchic Horn of Africa nation.

Here are some details about Yusuf:

* RESIGNATION:

-- Yusuf had been accused by donor countries and regional governments of being an obstacle to U.N.-hosted peace talks. His rift with Prime Minister Nur Hassan Hussein pushed the Western-backed interim government, struggling against Islamist insurgents, to the brink of collapse.

-- Diplomats said Yusuf's departure could help take the sting out of plans by Ethiopia to withdraw troops that have propped up the government. The Ethiopians drove Somali Islamists out of Mogadishu at the end of 2006 and have been battling the insurgents ever since. Yusuf admitted last month that Islamists control most of the country except Mogadishu and Baidoa.

* YUSUF BECOMES PRESIDENT:

-- In October 2004, in the 14th attempt since 1991 to restore a central government, deputies elected Yusuf as president. Participants said Ethiopia, Kenya and Yemen backed his election with cash.

-- In September 2006, Yusuf escaped the country's first suicide bomb attack in Baidoa. He blamed it on al Qaeda and Islamists.

* FALLING OUT WITH ETHIOPIA:

-- Ethiopia's military government detained him from 1985 to 1991 after he opposed their attempts to seize disputed territory along the Somalia-Ethiopia border. His imprisonment also involved a falling-out with Ethiopian strongman Mengistu Haile Mariam, who was said to have paid Yusuf at least $1 million to help destabilize Barre's government.

-- He led Somalia's autonomous enclave of Puntland from 1998 to 2004. The strategic territory was mostly peaceful under Yusuf's rule except from mid-2001 to mid-2002, when he was deposed over objections to his attempt to lengthen his term of office. Yusuf was also disliked by the leaders of neighboring Somaliland because of clashes over disputed border territory.

-- In 2000, Yusuf opposed Somalia's attempt to restore order when an Arab-backed Transitional National Government (TNG) was created at a conference of elders. Due to opposition from the country's many warlords, including Yusuf, the TNG's authority withered within months.

* LIFE DETAILS:

-- Yusuf has given his birth date as December 15, 1934, making him 74.

-- Yusuf was a career soldier and served as Somalia's military attache to the former Soviet Union in the 1960s. He was jailed for six years for refusing to take part in the 1969 coup that put Mohamed Siad Barre in power. He defected to Kenya after participating in a failed 1978 coup against Barre.