22 Jan. () –
French President Emmanuel Macron has summoned his counterpart from Burkina Faso, Ibrahim Traoré, to give him “clarifications” about the decision announced on Saturday to give French troops a month to leave the African country.
“We are awaiting clarification from Mr. Traoré on this issue,” Macron explained during his press conference in Paris on the occasion of the Franco-German summit with Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
“I am waiting for the acting president Traoré to speak, because I understand that these messages are mired in great confusion (…). I think we have to be very careful and pay attention to what is a specialty of some and what It may have something to do with what we are experiencing in Ukraine, namely our Russian friends,” he said.
On Saturday, the official Burkina Faso news agency, AIB, reported that the government had denounced the bilateral agreement for the deployment of French troops in the African country and that according to that same agreement it will give the French contingent a month to leave the country. . The agreement is in force since December 17, 2018.
France has some 400 special forces soldiers deployed in Burkina Faso as part of Operation Sabre.
Captain Ibrahim Traoré has ruled the country since the coup d’état on September 30 and has stated on several occasions his intention to recover “territorial integrity” and “national sovereignty.”
Burkina Faso has generally experienced a significant increase in insecurity since 2015, with attacks carried out by both the Al Qaeda affiliate and the Islamic State, which has caused a wave of internally displaced persons and refugees to other countries in the region.
