France’s ambassador and its diplomatic staff in Niger’s capital will be evacuated to France in the next few hours, French President Emmanuel Macron said on Sunday.
Macron also said that French troops will be leaving Niamey, Niger’s capital, in the upcoming weeks and months.
“French military presence will come to an end by the end of this year,” he added.Niger plunged into turmoil on July 26, when Gen. Abdourahamane Tchiani, a former commander of the presidential guard, led a military intervention that ousted President Mohamed Bazoum.
The announcement is a significant, if predicted, blow to France’s policy in Africa, after French troops pulled out of neighboring Mali and Burkina Faso in recent years after coups there. France had stationed thousands of troops in the region at the request of African leaders to fight jihadist groups.
France has maintained some 1,500 troops in Niger since the July coup, and had repeatedly refused an order by the new junta for its ambassador to leave, saying that France didn’t recognize the coup leaders as legitimate.
Tensions between France and Niger, a former French colony, have mounted in recent weeks, and Macron said recently that diplomats were surviving on military rations as they holed up in the embassy.
At the end of August, Niger’s military administration ordered the expulsion of French Ambassador Sylvain Itte, but Paris refused.
