Pressure on Niger's coup leaders mounted Sunday with the approach of the deadline set by the West African regional bloc ECOWAS for the military to relinquish control or face possible armed intervention.
Former colonial power France, with which the junta broke military ties after taking power on July 26, said it would"firmly" back whatever course of action ECOWAS took after the Sunday deadline expired.
"We want diplomacy to work, and we want this message clearly transmitted to them that we are giving them every opportunity to reverse what they have done," ECOWAS commissioner Abdel-Fatau Musah said on Friday. Yet anti-French sentiment in the region is on the rise, while Russian activity, often through the Wagner mercenary group, has grown. Moscow has warned against armed intervention from outside Niger.The coup"is an error of judgement that goes totally against the interests of the country", French Armed Forces Minister Sebastien Lecornu told AFP in an interview Saturday.
"We categorically refuse any military intervention," he said in a television interview Saturday evening, adding that such action would be"a direct threat to Algeria"."Algeria shares nearly a thousand kilometres" of border with Niger, he said. Bazoum, 63, has been held by the coup plotters with his family in his official Niamey residence since July 26.
Senior Nigerian politicians have urged President Bola Tinubu to reconsider the threatened military intervention.
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