The junta will authorize the armies of Burkina and Mali to intervene “in the event of aggression”

The soldiers who took power in Niger almost a month ago announced on Thursday that they would authorize the armed forces of their neighbors in Burkina Faso and Mali to intervene on their soil “in the event of aggression”.

The foreign ministers of Burkina Faso and Mali, Olivia Rouamba and Abdoulaye Diop, visited Niamey on Thursday where they were received by Niger’s new strongman, General Abdourahamane Tiani.

They “welcomed” the signing of orders “authorizing the defense and security forces of Burkina Faso and Mali to intervene in Nigerien territory in the event of aggression”, according to a press release read by Oumarou Ibrahim Sidi, the secretary general. Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Niger, at the end of the visit.

” Declaration of war “

Burkina and Mali, faced like Niger with recurrent jihadist violence, are also led by soldiers who took power by force between 2020 and 2022.

Very soon after the July 26 coup in Niamey, they showed their solidarity with the new Nigerien authorities, in particular in the face of the threat brandished by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to intervene militarily to restore constitutional order.

The two countries had thus warned ECOWAS against any intervention in Niger, which would be likened to a “declaration of war”, which they repeated on Thursday. General Tiani for his part assured Saturday that such an armed operation would be “not the walk in the park that some people believe in”.

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