Canada ‘strongly condemns’ Niger coup, but not threatening sanctions yet – National | 24CA News
Canada is talking out in opposition to a coup d’etat in Niger, however hasn’t joined different nations in threatening to chop help to the West African nation.
Last Wednesday, a faction of Niger’s navy claimed to have overthrown the nation’s democratically elected president Mohamed Bazoum after detaining him in his palace.
In a tweet Friday night, Global Affairs Canada wrote that Ottawa “strongly condemns the attempted coup” in Niger and requires Bazoum’s launch.
“We reaffirm our support for Niger’s democracy and reiterate our call for President Bazoum’s release,” the division wrote, whereas expressing help for the Economic Community of West African States, a gaggle of 15 international locations generally known as ECOWAS.
That bloc has threatened to sanction leaders of the navy junta and ship in troops if Bazoum isn’t restored to energy inside per week.
Britain and the European Union have pulled help from the nation, whereas Washington has mulled following swimsuit. The Trudeau authorities has given no indication it’s pondering of chopping again on growth and humanitarian {dollars} for Niger, which has amounted to roughly $60 million per yr.
The tumult in Niger is the most recent in a sequence of tried coups throughout the Sahel area, the place the so-called Islamic State group has been recruiting militants and committing massacres. The political instability comes because the Russian mercenary group Wagner meddles in international locations throughout the area.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau final met with Bazoum in November at a summit in Tunisia, the place he praised his “leadership in progressive values” similar to girls’s inclusion and democracy in a area of rising authoritarianism.
At the time, Bazoum famous Canada had been much less current in his nation for the reason that Nineteen Seventies when Ottawa because the forefront of growth packages.
“We have a little distancing and we’re going to work on that (to) make sure that our ties make us even closer,” Bazoum stated in French on Nov. 20, 2022. “We will be committed to making our relationship stronger.”
Four nations are run by navy governments in West and Central Africa, the place there have been 9 profitable or tried coups since 2020.
ECOWAS stated Sunday that every one its member international locations will droop industrial and monetary transactions with Niger and freeze property in regional central banks.
The financial sanctions might have a deep impact on Nigeriens, who stay within the third-poorest nation on this planet, in response to the most recent United Nations information. The nation depends on imports from Nigeria for as much as 90 per cent of its energy, in response to the International Renewable Energy Agency.
The sanctions could possibly be disastrous and Niger must discover a resolution to keep away from them, the nation’s Prime Minister Ouhoumoudou Mahamadou informed French media outlet Radio France Internationale on Sunday.
“When people say there’s an embargo, land borders are closed, air borders are closed, it’s extremely difficult for people. Niger is a country that relies heavily on the international community,” he stated in French.
The 15-nation ECOWAS bloc has unsuccessfully tried to revive democracies in nations the place the navy took energy lately.
In the Nineteen Nineties, ECOWAS intervened in Liberia throughout its civil battle. In 2017, it intervened in Gambia to forestall the brand new president’s predecessor, Yahya Jammeh, from disrupting the handover of energy. Around 7,000 troops from Ghana, Nigeria, and Senegal entered, in response to the Global Observatory, which supplies evaluation on peace and safety points.
If the regional bloc makes use of power, it might set off violence not solely between Niger and ECOWAS forces but additionally civilians supporting the coup and people in opposition to it, Niger analysts say.
“While this remains to be a threat and unlikely action, the consequences on civilians of such an approach if putschists chose confrontation would be catastrophic,” stated Rida Lyammouri, senior fellow on the Policy Center for the New South, a Morocco-based suppose tank.
Lyammouri additionally stated he doesn’t see a “military intervention happening because of the violence that could trigger.”
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken recommended ECOWAS’s management Sunday to “defend constitutional order in Niger” after the sanctions announcement, and joined the bloc in calling for the instant launch of Bazoum and his household.
–With recordsdata from The Associated Press
© 2023 The Canadian Press
