NIAMEY, Niger (AP) — France on Tuesday announced a planned evacuation of Niger after a military coup there won the backing of two other West African nations ruled by mutinous soldiers.
The French Foreign Ministry in Paris said the evacuation “will happen quickly.” He gave no other immediate details.
The French decision to evacuate comes amid a deepening crisis caused by the coup last week against the democratically elected president of Niger, Mohamed Bazoum.
The West African regional body known as ECOWAS announced economic and travel sanctions against Niger on Sunday, saying it would use force if the putschists do not reinstate Bazoum within a week. Bazoum’s government was one of those of the West last democratic partners against West African extremists.
In a joint statement by Mali and Burkina Faso, their military governments wrote that “any military intervention against Niger will be considered a declaration of war against Burkina Faso and Mali.”
Colonel Abdoulaye Maiga, Mali’s state minister for territorial administration and decentralization, read the statement on Malian state television Monday night. The two countries also denounced the ECOWAS economic sanctions as “illegal, illegitimate and inhumane” and refused to apply them.
ECOWAS suspended all commercial and financial transactions between its member states and Niger, as well as freezing Niger’s assets in regional central banks. Niger is highly dependent on foreign aid and sanctions could impoverish even more is more than 25 million people.
Mali and Burkina Faso have each suffered two blows since 2020, when soldiers toppled governments that claimed they could do a better job fighting rising jihadist violence linked to al-Qaida and the Islamic State group. ECOWAS has sanctioned both countries and suspended them from the bloc, but has never threatened to use force.
Also on Sunday, Guinea, another country under military rule since 2021, issued a statement in support of the Niger junta and urged ECOWAS to “come to its senses.”
“The sanction measures advocated by ECOWAS, including military intervention, are an option that would not be a solution to the current problem, but would lead to a human disaster whose consequences could extend beyond the borders of Niger,” said Ibrahima Sory. Bangoura, brigade general, in a statement from the ruling party. He added that Guinea would not apply the sanctions.
In anticipation of the ECOWAS decision on Sunday, thousands of supporters of the junta took to the streets in Niamey, denouncing France, waving Russian flags along with banners reading “Down with France” and supporting Russian President Vladimir Putin and tell the international community to stay away.
There has been no clear explanation of the Russian symbols, but the country seems to symbolize the anti-Western sentiments of the protesters.
Protesters also burned a door and smashed windows at the French embassy before the Nigerien army dispersed them.
Niger could be following in the same footsteps as Mali and Burkina Faso, say analysts, who saw protesters wave Russian flags after their respective coups. After the second coup in Burkina Faso in September, the protesters also attacked the embassy of France in the capital, Ouagadougou, and damaged and looted the Institut Francais, France’s international cultural promotion organization.
If ECOWAS uses force, it could also unleash violence between civilians supporting the coup and those against it, Niger analysts say.
While unlikely, “the consequences for civilians of such an approach if the coup leaders choose confrontation would be catastrophic,” said Rida Lyammouri, a senior fellow at the Policy Center for the New South, a Morocco-based think tank.
Lyammouri does not see a “military intervention because of the violence it could unleash,” he said.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Sunday praised ECOWAS leaders’ determination to “uphold the constitutional order in Niger” after the sanctions were announced, joining the bloc in calling for their immediate release. of Bazoum and his family.
Also on Sunday, the junta’s spokesman, Colonel Major Amadou Abdramane, banned the use of social media to spread messages that he describes as detrimental to state security. He also claimed without evidence that the Bazoum government had authorized the French to carry out attacks to free Bazoum.
Observers believe Bazoum is being held at his home in the capital, Niamey. The first photos of him since the coup appeared on Sunday night, sitting on a sofa smiling next to Chadian President Mahamat Deby, who had flown in to mediate between the government and the junta.
Both the United States and France have sent troops and hundreds of millions of dollars in military and humanitarian aid in recent years to Niger, which was a French colony until 1960. The country was seen as the last to work with the West against extremism in a country francophone region where anti-French sentiment had opened the way for the Russian private military group Wagner.
After neighboring Mali and Burkina Faso drove out the French army and began working with Wagner’s mercenaries, Blinken visited niger in march to strengthen ties and announce $150 million in direct assistance, calling the country “a model of democracy.”
The United States will consider cutting aid if the coup is successful, the State Department said Monday. The aid is “very much in balance depending on the outcome of actions in the country,” said Matt Miller, spokesman for the department. “Assistance from the United States is contingent on the continuation of democratic rule in Niger.”
The sanctions could be disastrous and Niger needs to find a solution to avoid them, Prime Minister Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou told French media outlet Radio France Internationale on Sunday.
“When people say there is an embargo, the land borders are closed, the air borders are closed, it is extremely difficult for people… Niger is a country that is highly dependent on the international community,” he said.
In the Niger capital, many people are living in makeshift shelters tied up with wooden slats, sheeting and plastic sheeting because they cannot pay the rent. They struggle every day to earn enough money to feed their children.
Since the 1990s, the 15 ECOWAS nations have tried to protect democracies against the threat of coups, with mixed success.
Four nations are run by military governments in West and Central Africa, where there have been nine attempted or attempted coups since 2020.
In the 1990s, ECOWAS intervened in Liberia during its civil war, one of the bloodiest conflicts in Africa and one that left many wary of intervening in internal conflicts. In 2017, ECOWAS intervened in The Gambia to prevent the new president’s predecessor, Yahya Jammeh, from disrupting the handover. About 7,000 soldiers from Ghana, Nigeria and Senegal entered the country, according to the Global Observatory, which provides analysis on peace and security issues. The intervention was largely considered to have accomplished its mission.
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AP writer John Leicester in Paris contributed to this report.