By Ayo Kehinde
Derby with Abdourahamane
Military heads of state in Burkina Faso, Mali and Guinea have pledged their support for the Nigerien coup plotters following Sunday’s anti- coup stand of ECOWAS leaders during a meeting hosted by Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu, Chairman of ECOWAS.
The ECOWAS leaders gave the Niger junta a seven -day ultimatum to restore President Mohamed Bazoum to power or face military intervention amid sanctions already imposed on the one week old regime.
In a swift reaction, the Faso Presidency said it has learned with dismay the serious sanctions imposed on Niger by CEDEAO on Sunday 30th July 2023 in Abuja.
According to the Communication Directorate of the Faso Presidency, “the President of the Transition, Head of State, Captain Ibrahim TRAORE and the President of the Malian Transition, Colonel Assimi GOITA, during their meeting in Saint Petersburg, July 27, 2023 agreed to stand ready to assist Niger, against any violation of its territorial integrity.
“A request for technical and military assistance has been submitted to Russian President Vladimir Putin to technically and materially support this initiative.
“During their face-to-face meeting, they also spoke by telephone with Lieutenant Colonel Mamadi Doumbouya, the Head of State of Guinea who is a member of the project.
“In addition, they have trained their technical services to quickly study solutions to be adopted by the two countries in order to help soften the likely economic and humanitarian sanctions that the CEDEAO summit would adopt against Niger.”
As earlier reported by THISAGENEWS, Chadian head of state, Idris Derby had paid a diplomatic visit to Niamey on Monday after attending the Abuja meeting in a follow up attempt to negotiate peace in Niger. He met with deposed President Bazoum and head of the junta, Abdourahamane Tchiani.
