They had been suspended from these two organizations following the successive takeovers by the military in 2020, 2021 and 2022. Mali and Guinea had also been subject to other sanctions, partly lifted since.
See: Mali, Burkina Faso and Guinea request their reintegration into ECOWAS and the African Union
“As part of the fight once morest insecurity in the Sahelo-Saharan strip”, the three ministers “raised the need to combine their efforts and those of the countries of the sub-region and the region to deal with this scourge “adds the declaration, read by the head of Burkinabe diplomacy Olivia Rouamba.
Mrs. Rouamba, the Malian Abdoulaye Diop and the Guinean Morissanda Kouyaté, “call for a coherence of actions at the regional level, on the basis of the bilateral efforts already implemented”.
They lamented “mechanically imposed sanctions that fail to take into account the deep and complex causes of political change”.
Ces sanctions “affect populations already bruised by insecurity and political instability, deprive ECOWAS and the AU of the contribution of the three countries necessary to meet the major challenges, and undermine the sub-regional and African solidarity which constitutes the principle cardinal of integration, regional and continental cooperation”.
They call “to concrete and substantial technical and financial support for security efforts and to accompany the process of returning to a constitutional order”theoretically scheduled for 2024 in Mali and Burkina Faso, in 2025 in Guinea.
According to Morissanda Kouyaté, “we already belong to bodies, ECOWAS and the African Union, we are not going to reinvent the wheel”. “It is not acceptable that 60 years following independence, there are three of us discussing these issues”for his part estimated Abdoulaye Diop.
The meeting in Ouagadougou took place two days following the visit to Mali on Tuesday by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who promised his aid “to the Sahelo-Saharan region and even to the countries bordering the Gulf of Guinea”.
The series of coups in Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso, and the instability of the Sahel plagued by jihadist violence, despite the deployment of international forces, have paved the way for the Russian presence.
After Mali, Burkina has also been bloodied by jihadist violence and, like its neighbour, it has just requested the departure of the 400 members of the French forces from its territory, without however considering the rupture of diplomatic relations with France, ex -colonial power in the region where it is increasingly reviled.
Both countries have moved closer to Russia. According to Westerners, mercenaries from the Russian Wagner group are deployed in Mali, which Bamako denies, which only recognizes the presence of Russian instructors.
Captain Ibrahim Traoré, the Burkinabè head of state, also denied the presence of Wagner mercenaries in Burkina, saying that “our Wagners are the VDPs”Volunteers for the defense of the fatherland, the civilian auxiliaries of the army.
