West African bloc presents junta-led states six months to rethink exit By Reuters

By Camillus Eboh

ABUJA (Reuters) – Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger will profit from a six-month grace interval after their deliberate exit from West Africa’s primary political and financial grouping subsequent month, throughout which the bloc ECOWAS will attempt to persuade them to remain, the bloc’s leaders agreed. on Sunday.

The Financial Group of West African States (ECOWAS) summit was seen as a possibility to deal with the three nations’ imminent withdrawal on January 29, a 12 months after they collectively introduced their departure, thus ending a long time of regional integration.

ECOWAS has up to now didn’t push them to rethink their resolution, whereas the three nations within the insurgencies-torn central Sahel area have arrange their very own alliance, in search of ever nearer alignment within the protection and different areas and mentioned the abandonment of the West African forex. union.

Whereas January 29 stays the official date of withdrawal, the efficient date of their departure has been prolonged till July 29 – a transition interval throughout which the bloc’s mediators will search “to deliver the three member nations again into ECOWAS with out prejudice,” declared the president of the fee. » declared Oumar Touray after the summit.

On Saturday, Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso reaffirmed their resolution to go away the nation as irreversible and collectively declared that their territories would stay visa-free for all ECOWAS residents after their exit.

The transfer might be an effort to answer warnings that their departure threatens the bloc’s freedom of motion and its frequent market of 400 million folks.

Their withdrawal would finish a tumultuous interval for the Sahel, the place a sequence of coups since 2020 dropped at energy navy authorities who favored nearer ties with Russia on the expense of the previous colonial ruler, the France, and different regional allies and different regional allies. elsewhere.