2023-08-02 21:13:00
A week following the military coup in Niger, the junta leader called the Economic Community of West African States sanctions “unjust and inhumane”.
General Abdourahamane Tiani, who spoke on the occasion of Niger’s Independence Day, assured that he “rejected en bloc” the sanctions put in place by ECOWAS. According to him, they are “unjust and inhuman” and aim to “pauperize” Nigeriens.
“The CNSP (National Council for the Safeguarding of the Fatherland, in power) rejects these sanctions en bloc and refuses to give in to any threat and wherever they come from,” he said. “We refuse any interference in the internal affairs of Niger,” he added.
According to him, “these sanctions are cynical and iniquitous”, aim to “humiliate the FDS (Defence and Security Forces), Niger and its people” and to make “the situation untenable and the country ungovernable”. “Nowhere in this contemptuous and belligerent attitude did the ‘West African’ leaders take into account the sovereignty of our country,” he said.
Sanctions and international departures
ECOWAS ordered an economic blockade of Niger, deciding the “immediate” suspension of “all commercial and financial transactions” with Niger and threatened to use “force” if President Mohamed Bazoum, overthrown on July 26, was not reinstated within seven days.
General Tiani reiterated that it was mainly due to the deterioration of security in Niger, which was plagued by jihadist violence, that the military had seized power, saying: “it is the life of Nigeriens and Niger that it is question”.
Moreover, according to him, the French “have no objective reason to leave Niger” because they “have never been the object of the slightest threat”, when several hundred of them are evacuated by Paris .
He denounced “the use of military force” during the demonstration on Sunday in Niamey in front of the French embassy where tear gas and “weapons”, according to the Nigerien military, were used to disperse the crowd. Paris had denied the use of “lethal means”.
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