By Elizabeth Sykes

In a statement televised on August 13, a Niger military spokesperson announced charges against deposed Niger President Mohamed Bazoum of “high treason and undermining the internal and external security” of Niger, over his exchanges with international organizations, says Reuters.

The United Nations and Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) condemned the statement and have started imposing stringent sanctions on Niger, as well as decided to assemble a standby military force for intervention purposes. 

Since the Nigerien coup on July 26, Bazoum and his family have been detained at his official residence in Niamey, said Al Jazeera. 

According to several sources, the junta has been denying Bazoum food, water, and medical aid, and threatening to kill him if West African countries follow through on reversing the coup.

UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said on Monday, “We remain extremely concerned about the state of being, the health and safety of the president and his family, and again we call for his immediate and unconditional release and his reinstatement as head of state.” 

Nigeria has cut off electricity to its neighbor Niger, and the 15-member West African bloc countries have severed financial transactions to the landlocked country, blocking food and medicine to a poverty-stricken nation.

ECOWAS members are fractured about possible military intervention to reinstate Bazoum. According to the New York Times, ECOWAS has received warnings from Russia and Algeria over intervention, but coup leaders have said they have no intention of collaborating with the Russian Wagner military group or harming the deposed president Bazoum.

The Peace and Security Council of the African Union, consisting of 55 countries, met last Monday to discuss Niger’s coup, one of seven in three years in West and Central Africa that the Western bloc has failed to stem. Niger’s neighbors Mali and Burkina Faso are also governed by military juntas, and have said intervention would be a declaration of war on them, said the NYT. 

The coup in Niger is a major blow to the West, as Niger was one partner in the Sahel region that helped repulse uprisings associated with Jihadist al-Qaeda and ISIS. International forces are struggling desperately to find a peaceful solution to Niger’s leadership.

Both America and France have over a thousand troops in Niger each, with other assistance in the country from Italy and Germany. France and the U.S. have invested hundreds of millions of dollars in training Niger’s forces, a backhand blow because of the coup.

France’s troops have been told to depart before early September. Instead of military intervention, the Biden administration has called for negotiations to reinstate Niger’s democratic government, but as leadership issues rise within the region, instability with the West also is escalating. Russian influence has grown and could destabilize the region even more in favor of Al-Qaeda. 

The ECOWAS parliament on Saturday said it would like to send a committee to meet the junta in Niamey, though the junta has rebuffed several delegate parties from West African countries already.

Nnamdi Obasi, a senior adviser with the Crisis Group think tank, from AP News, said, “the use of force could lead to unintended and catastrophic consequences with unpredictable outcomes,” warning military intervention could escalate “major regional conflict” between allied democracies and militaries.

Cameron Hudson, a former U.S. CIA official, said the African Union Peace and Security Council could possibly overrule any ECOWAS decision that disrupted the wider peace and security of the continent threatened by an intervention. 

It is unclear, however, how quickly the junta would respond if military action was taken against the coup members. Now that coup leadership has set in, careful negotiation may be the only way to help the people of Niger and its deposed president, without causing even more war and destruction in the region.