EU foreign policy chief Borrell said the EU had “suspended all security cooperation (…) with immediate effect and indefinitely.” For the EU, Bazoum remains “the only legitimate president of Niger”. The head of the Presidential Guard, General Abdourahamane Tiani, had previously presented himself as the country’s new ruler.
The African Union (AU) Peace and Security Council has called on Niger’s military to retreat to their barracks within 15 days and restore “constitutional authority” in the West African country. The AU was also “deeply concerned by the worrying resurgence of military coups” on the African continent.
The United States, meanwhile, says it is working to ensure the “full restoration of constitutional order and democratic government in Niger.” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken warned the putschists that hundreds of millions of dollars in aid to the country were at stake.
French President Emmanuel Macron, for his part, convened a meeting of the Security and Defense Council on the situation in Niger. The former colonial power France still has 1,500 soldiers stationed in the West African country.
About a hundred Bundeswehr soldiers are also stationed in Niger. Defense Minister Boris Pistorius initially saw no acute threat to them on Friday. As the minister told the “Spiegel”, the situation is “dynamic”. For example, “it is not yet clear how the leadership will position itself in relation to the commitment of the western partners in the future”.
The Bundeswehr maintains an air transport base in Niamey, which is also important for the withdrawal from neighboring Mali that has begun. According to the Bundeswehr Operations Command, there are currently around a hundred German soldiers from the UN mission Minusma in Mali and the EU mission EUMPM in Niger at this base. The soldiers were “well,” the Bundeswehr said on Friday on the online network Twitter, which was renamed “X”.
On Wednesday, the Nigerien military arrested the Bazoum, who had been in office since 2021. The head of the Presidential Guard, General Tiani, presented himself as the country’s new strongman on Friday. As “President of the National Council for the Protection of the Fatherland,” he justified the coup in a speech on state television with the worsening of the security situation and, according to him, a questionable security concept for the fight against terrorism.
Two of Bazoum’s senior advisers strongly disagreed with General Tiani’s justification for the coup. In a statement obtained by the AFP news agency, Deputy Prime Ministers Daouda Takoubakoye and Oumar Moussa condemned the coup, which took place “for personal reasons”. They also denounced “lies brought forward by the putschists.”
Bazoum, now 63, was the first head of state in Niger, which has been independent since the end of French colonial rule in 1960, to have gained the post through a peaceful transfer of power.
Niger is one of the last countries allied with the West in the crisis-ridden Sahel region. After Mali and Burkina Faso, it is also the third country in the Sahel to have experienced a coup since 2020.
