 will reconvene on Thursday after a military coup that seized power in Niger){kind=link}
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The leaders of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) will reconvene on Thursday after a military coup that seized power in Niger Republic on July 26 defied a deadline to reinstate the ousted president.
ECOWAS, which has sent military forces into troubled member states in the past, had told the junta to stand down by Sunday, but coup leaders instead closed Niger’s airspace and pledged to defend the country.
ECOWAS made the announcement on Monday — a day after its deadline to the military junta in Niger to reinstate the ousted President Mohamed Bazoum.
West African States (ECOWAS) has convened another Extraordinary Summit of the Authority on the political situation in the Republic of Niger. The Summit will hold in Abuja, on Thursday, August 10, 2023.
— Ecowas – Cedeao (@ecowas_cedeao) August 7, 2023
“Niger’s armed forces and all our defence and security forces, backed by the unfailing support of our people, are ready to defend the integrity of our territory,” a junta representative said in a statement on national television.
Landlocked Niger is more than twice the size of France and many flight paths across Africa would normally pass through its airspace. Air France suspended flights to and from Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso and Bamako in Mali, which both border Niger, until Aug. 11 and warned that some flight times would increase.
ECOWAS spokesperson Emos Lungu said the bloc would hold an extraordinary summit to discuss Niger on Thursday in Abuja, the Nigerian capital, where it has its headquarters.
The 15-nation club has taken a harder stance on the Niger coup, the region’s seventh in three years, than it did on previous ones. Its credibility is at stake because it had said it would tolerate no further such overthrows.
ECOWAS defence chiefs agreed on Friday on a possible military action plan if the detained president, Mohamed Bazoum, was not released and reinstated, although they said operational decisions would be decided by heads of states.
But the bloc’s unity has been broken by a promise from the ruling juntas in Mali and Burkina Faso, both member states, to come to Niger’s defence if needed.
Both countries were sending delegations to Niamey to show solidarity, the Malian army said on social media on Monday, and flight tracking website FlightRadar24 showed a Burkina Faso military plane arriving in Niamey at around 1120 GMT.
A fracture within ECOWAS and escalation of the stand-off with Niger would further destabilise one of the world’s poorest regions, already facing a hunger crisis and an Islamist insurgency that has killed thousands and displaced millions.
Niger’s uranium and oil reserves and its pivotal role in a war with Islamist militants in the Sahel region give it economic and strategic importance for the United States, Europe, China and Russia.