While tensions are very high in West Africa, notably with the coup d’etat in Niger on July 26, Paris is putting pressure on Ouagadougou. France has thus decided to suspend “until further notice all its development aid and budget support actions” in Burkina Faso, the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced on Sunday evening.
This announcement is made while Burkina Faso and Mali are in solidarity with the soldiers who took power in Niger. France supports the countries of ECOWAS, the Economic Community of West African States, in their efforts to restore President Mohamed Bazoum. ECOWAS threatened to intervene militarily. His ultimatum for the return to constitutional order also ended Sunday at midnight.
Relations deteriorated since the putsch of 2022
Ongoing French development aid projects in favor of Burkina Faso represent 482 million euros while the budget aid programmed in 2022 amounts to 13 million, indicated the Quai d’Orsay.
Relations between France and Burkina have deteriorated since Captain Ibrahim Traoré came to power in a coup in September 2022. On January 18, the Ouagadougou authorities had requested the departure, within a month, of the French Saber force in Burkina Faso.
France had recorded this departure but had not suspended either its development aid or its budgetary aid as it had done for Mali. However, on July 29, three days after the putsch in Niger, Paris suspended all its development aid and budget support actions in Niamey.