Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger reject the withdrawal deadline announced “unilaterally” by ECOWAS

The coup leaders decide to put the security forces “on maximum alert” and ask to “redouble” surveillance

Dec. 23 (EUROPA PRESS) –

The Alliance of Sahel States, the regional organization created by the coup leaders of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, has rejected this Sunday the six-month withdrawal period granted by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), therefore which the organization has accused of maintaining “imperialist and neocolonialist ambitions.”

“The college of heads of state of the AES considers the decision to extend for six months the withdrawal of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger from ECOWAS as a new attempt that would allow the French junta and its delegates to continue planning and carrying out actions of destabilization against the AES,” reads a joint statement.

The three countries have criticized “this unilateral extension decision”, which has “surprised” them, instead of maintaining “concerted management” between both alliances regarding the technical aspects related to the “withdrawal with immediate effect.” “We note with regret that within ECOWAS, destabilization maneuvers are regularly initiated by a handful of heads of state who impose their wishes and foreign agendas on the rest,” they added.

Likewise, they have pointed out that “they are following with great attention the deceptive maneuvers initiated by the French junta under the pretext of closing its military bases in certain African countries to replace them with a less visible device but that pursues the same neocolonial ambition”, while they have highlighted Added to this are “the reorganization and regrouping operations of terrorist groups in the Lake Chad basin, in the Sahel and in several border areas.

In this context, they have decided to “put the security forces on maximum alert,” as well as “make the confederal space a single theater of military operations, coexisting with the national ones.” They have also called on local populations to “redouble their vigilance, systematically report any suspicious incident to the security forces, and reject proposals for affiliation by terrorist groups.”

The military leaders of the three countries, Burkinabé Captain Ibrahim Traoré, Malian Colonel Assimi Goita, and Nigerien General Abdourahamane Tchiani, accused ECOWAS of “acting under the influence of foreign powers” and of having “become a threat to its Member States and their populations”.

His departure represents the collective abandonment of almost 70 million people from the pan-African organization, whose mediators have tried without success to reduce the deadlines for its, until now, three suspended members (four, counting Guinea) to proclaim elections for the return to order. civil.