OUAGADOUGOU (Reuters) – The foreign ministers of Burkina Faso, Guinea and Mali, three countries ruled by military juntas, have proposed a regional partnership to facilitate trade and tackle insecurity in the region, they said in a joint statement Thursday night.
Foreign Ministers Olivia Rouamba for Burkina Faso, Morissansa Kouyate for Guinea and Abdoulaye Diop for Mali, met in Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso, this week to discuss this collaboration.
The three ministers noted “the need to set up and institutionalize a permanent framework for consultation between the three countries”.
The Bamako-Conakry-Ouagadougou link will serve as the basis for fuel and electricity exchanges, transport links between the three capitals, cooperation in mining exploration, rural development and trade, the statement said.
It will centralize the fight against insecurity in the Sahel region of West Africa and beyond, the statement added.
Burkina Faso, Guinea and Mali have all experienced military coups since 2020 that toppled then-democratic regimes amid frustrations over governments’ inability to protect civilians from a jihadist insurgency. , among others.
These coups soured relations with regional and Western allies and led to economic sanctions, including from West Africa’s main economic and regional bloc, ECOWAS, and the African Union.
The three delegations deplored these measures and called for technical and financial support for their democratic transitions, according to the statement.
(Report by Thiam Ndiaga, written by Sofia Christensen, French version Dina Kartit, edited by Blandine Hénault)
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