Did you miss the latest events on the conflict in Niger? 20 minutes takes stock for you every evening at 8 p.m. Who did what ? Who said what? Where are we ? The answer below.
news of the day
At least 17 soldiers in Niger have been killed in an attack by suspected jihadists near the Burkina Faso border in southwestern Niger. It is the deadliest attack since the July 26 coup.
The soldiers who took power, headed by General Abdourahamane Tiani, mainly put forward “the deterioration of the security situation” to justify their coup d’etat. However, the Nigerien army has been mobilized for years in the fight against jihadists, particularly in the immense region of Tillabéri, located in the so-called “three borders” zone between Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali. It is in this area, the haunt of Sahelian jihadists, including those of the Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (EIGS), that Tuesday’s deadly attack took place.
The number of the day
1,500. This is the number of soldiers France had in Niger before the coup. The former colonial power actively participated with the Nigerien army in the fight against these jihadist groups. She has since become one of the favored targets of the new regime in Niamey, which accuses her of influencing the decisions of ECOWAS.
sentence of the day
We are in a process of transition, we explained the ins and outs, and reiterated our availability to remain open and exchange with all parties, but insisted on the independence of our country.
These are the words of the head of government formed after the coup in Niger, Ali Mahaman Lamine Zeine. The economist by training who was Minister of Finance in the 2000s went to Chad, which shares nearly 1,200 km of border with Niger. Zeine was received by the transitional president, Mahamat Idriss Deby Itno “We have arrived bearing a message from the Head of State of Niger, General Tiani, who expresses his solidarity and his fraternity, and who asks me to renew this feeling of good neighborliness and good fraternity between Chad and Niger”, also assured Zeine.
The trend of the day
Three weeks after taking power, the threat of military intervention by the countries of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) still hangs over Niamey. Tomorrow, Thursday, and Friday, the West African chiefs of staff are to meet to discuss the details of such an operation. This meeting initially scheduled for August 12 had been postponed and will finally take place on August 17 and 18 in Accra, the Ghanaian capital, according to a regional military source and a source within ECOWAS.
Calls for a peaceful resolution to this crisis have however multiplied in recent days, including among certain Western partners such as the United States. “We remain focused on the diplomatic way to obtain (…) the return to constitutional order, and I believe that there continues to be a margin to obtain this result by diplomacy”, thus declared Tuesday the head of the American diplomacy Antony Blinken.
Earlier in the day, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Malian counterpart Assimi Goïta had also underlined during a telephone interview “the importance of resolving the situation” in Niger “only by peaceful politico-diplomatic means”.