NIAMEY, Niger: West African nations on Friday suspended a key military meeting on the crisis in Niger, a day after saying they would muster a “standby” force in their bid to reinstate the country’s deposed leader.
Fears also mounted for elected President Mohamed Bazoum, who was ousted by members of his guard on July 26, with reports saying his detention conditions were deteriorating.
Chiefs of staff from West African ECOWAS bloc countries were set to attend a meeting on Saturday in Ghana’s capital Accra, regional military sources had said on Friday.
But they later said that it had been suspended indefinitely for “technical reasons.”
The sources said the meeting was originally set up to inform the organization’s leaders about “the best options” for activating and deploying the standby force.
ECOWAS has yet to provide details on the force or a timetable for action, and the leaders have emphasised they still want a peaceful solution.
The last-minute cancelation came as thousands of coup supporters rallied near a French military base in Niger on Friday.
Meanwhile, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken lamented that Niger’s military leaders have refused to release the family of the detained president in a proposed goodwill gesture.
In a phone call with Niger’s former president Mahamadou Issoufou, a fellow Western ally whom Bazoum served, Blinken “expressed his grave concern at the continued unlawful detention under deteriorating conditions of President Bazoum and his family.”
Blinken “shared that he is particularly dismayed by the refusal of those who seized power in Niger to release Bazoum’s family members as a demonstration of goodwill,” a State Department statement said.
During Friday's rally, protesters near the base on the outskirts of the capital Niamey shouted “down with France, down with ECOWAS.”
Niger’s new leaders have accused ex-colonial power France, a close Bazoum ally, of being behind the hard-line ECOWAS stance against the coup.
Many brandished Russian and Niger flags and shouted their support for the country’s new strongman, General Abdourahamane Tiani.
“We are going to make the French leave! ECOWAS isn’t independent, it’s being manipulated by France,” said one demonstrator, Aziz Rabeh Ali, a member of a students’ union.
France has around 1,500 personnel in Niger as part of a force battling an eight-year jihadist insurgency.
It is facing growing hostility across the Sahel, withdrawing its anti-jihadist forces from neighboring Mali and Burkina Faso last year after falling out with military governments that ousted elected leaders.
Niger’s new leaders scrapped defense agreements with France last week, while a hostile protest outside the French embassy in Niamey on July 30 prompted Paris to evacuate its citizens.
EU, AU sound alarm
The European Union and African Union (AU) joined others in sounding the alarm for Bazoum on Friday.
“Bazoum and his family, according to the latest information, have been deprived of food, electricity and medical care for several days,” said EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell.
UN rights chief Volker Turk said Bazoum’s reported detention conditions “could amount to inhuman and degrading treatment, in violation of international human rights law.”
The AU said “such treatment of a democratically elected president” was “unacceptable.”
German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock warned that the “coup plotters must face harsh consequences should anything happen” to Bazoum or his family.
A source close to Bazoum said “he’s OK, but the conditions are very difficult.” The coup leaders had threatened to assault him in the event of military intervention, the source added.
Human Rights Watch said it had spoken to Bazoum earlier this week. The 63-year-old described the treatment of himself, his wife and their 20-year-old son as “inhuman and cruel,” HRW said.
“I’m not allowed to receive my family members (or) my friends who have been bringing food and other supplies to us,” the group quoted him as saying.
“My son is sick, has a serious heart condition, and needs to see a doctor,” he was quoted as saying. “They’ve refused to let him get medical treatment.”
Under pressure to stem a cascade of coups among its members, ECOWAS had previously issued a seven-day ultimatum to the coup leaders to return Bazoum to power.
But they defied the deadline, which expired on Sunday without any action being taken.
The coup leaders have since named a new government, which met for the first time on Friday.
Fifth coup in 63 years
Since 1990, the 15-country bloc has intervened among six of its members at times of civil war, insurrection or political turmoil.
But the possibility of intervention in deeply fragile Niger has sparked debate within its ranks and warnings from neighboring Algeria as well as from Russia.
Moscow, whose influence in the region has grown, said a military solution “could lead to a protracted confrontation” in Niger and “a sharp destabilization” across the Sahel.
The president of ECOWAS member Cape Verde, Jose Maria Neves, spoke out against a military intervention on Friday and said his country was unlikely to participate in such a campaign.
Military-ruled ECOWAS nations Mali and Burkina Faso have warned an intervention would be a “declaration of war” on their countries.
General Salifou Mody, Niger’s new defense minister, made a brief visit to Mali on Friday, according to a Malian presidential adviser speaking on condition of anonymity.
The coup is Niger’s fifth since the landlocked country gained independence from France in 1960.
Like Mali and Burkina Faso, the country is struggling with a brutal jihadist insurgency that has claimed thousands of lives, forced many people from their homes and undermined faith in government.
