The French president, Emmanuel Macron, denounced this Friday that the French ambassador to Niger, Sylvain Itté, is a “hostage” of the military junta that has governed this country since the coup d’état on July 26. After the riot, the Nigerien military withdrew the ambassador’s diplomatic immunity and declared him a person non grata. Macron decided to keep it, since he does not recognize the Junta and continues to consider the deposed president, Mohamed Bazoum, legitimate.
“At the moment I speak to you, we have an ambassador and diplomatic members who are literally hostages in the French Embassy,” Macron told reporters during a visit to the Côtes-d’Or department. “They are prevented from supplying food, they eat with military rations. They are still there because France simply considers, by supporting democracy and considering that there is no double standard with Africa, that President Bazoum, held hostage in his house, is the legitimately elected president.
The president explained that Ambassador Itté “no longer has the possibility of leaving, he is a person non grata and it is rejected that it can be fed.” Regarding the possibility of a decision to repatriate him, Macron responded: “I will do what we agree with President Bazoum because he is the legitimate authority.”
Macron spoke these words in response to a question about a controversy over a Government circular that called for the suspension of cultural cooperation with Niger, Burkina Faso and Mali, countries where in recent years there have been coups d’état hostile to France. The president declared that France will continue to welcome artists from these countries, but indicated that, if visas are denied to local artists in cases like that of Niger, it is because the Embassy is not operational.
Macron’s words are a denunciation and at the same time a description of a situation that is deteriorating day by day. When the military withdrew Itté’s diplomatic immunity, Paris was already contemplating the scenario of an ambassador and his team isolated from him in the embassy. The statements also indicate that the French president remains in tension with the Junta of Niger, a month and a half after the coup, and refuses to recognize the coup plotters as a legitimate Government.
In addition to the ambassador and his team, France maintains a contingent of 1,500 soldiers in Niger on an anti-terrorist mission. Bilateral cooperation was suspended after the coup.
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Preparations for a possible withdrawal have begun. At the beginning of September, talks began between French and Nigerien militaries “to facilitate the movement of French military assets immobilized since the suspension of anti-terrorist cooperation,” reported the French Ministry of the Armies.
A few days later, Macron denied that it was a withdrawal. “If we redeploy whatever it is, I will only do so at the request of President Bazoum and in coordination with him, not with those responsible who are holding a president hostage today.”
American drones
Faced with the manifest hostility between the military junta and the French authorities, relations with the United States seem to be taking another direction. This week, the Nigerien military authorized US drones to carry out surveillance operations outside the two bases where they are present, in Niamey, the capital, and Agadez. Although the soldiers of this country have not resumed anti-terrorist operations or their assistance to the Nigerien army, these permits show a willingness to collaborate far removed from that they maintain with the French forces. At all times, Washington has shown greater lukewarmness towards the regime change in Niger and does not even use the term “coup d’état” when referring to the military’s seizure of power on July 26.
On the other hand, the Nigerien authorities have unilaterally broken the military agreement that they had with neighboring Benin since 2022 after accusing the authorities of that country of preparing “an aggression” against Niger. Although the possibility of a military intervention by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), raised a few days after the coup d’état of July 26, has not been ruled out, it does seem to have cooled down in the face of enormous financial difficulties. and logistics that it faces, as well as due to the rejection of a large part of the international community, even within Africa itself. This Thursday, a discreet virtual summit of the heads of state of ECOWAS was held, the content of which has not been revealed.
On the other hand, the transitional government of Burkina Faso, a country also ruled by a military junta after the two successive coups d’état in 2022, has decided to break its entire military relationship with France. After denouncing the agreements that linked both countries and expelling a small unit of special forces present in the country, the Burkinabe Executive this Thursday withdrew its endorsement of Emmanuel Pasquier, defense attaché of the French Embassy in Burkina Faso, “for subversive activities,” according to a note sent to Paris by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the African country in which they give him two weeks to leave Burkina Faso. Likewise, Ouagadougou has announced the closure of its military mission in Paris.
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