West Africa ECOWAS bloc lifts sanctions on Mali junta, delegate says

West African leaders on Sunday lifted financial and trade sanctions they imposed on Mali's military regime, accepting the junta's date for a March 2024 return to civilian rule, a delegate at a regional summit said.

Heads of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) had gathered to assess efforts to secure timetables and other guarantees for restoring civilian rule in Mali, Guinea and Burkina Faso.

Mali underwent coups in August 2020 and May 2021, followed by Guinea in September 2021 and Burkina Faso this January.

Fearing contagion in a region notorious for military takeovers, ECOWAS has imposed tough trade and economic sanctions against Mali, but lesser punishments against Guinea and Burkina Faso.

"It's done," one delegate at the ECOWAS summit told AFP.

"We have decided to lift economic and financial sanctions against Mali."

ECOWAS in January imposed a trade and financial embargo on Mali after its military government unveiled a scheme to rule for five years.

The sanctions have badly hit the poor and landlocked Sahel state, whose economy is already under severe strain from a decade-long jihadist insurgency.

After months of bitter talks, the Malian authorities on Wednesday approved a plan to hold presidential elections in February 2024.

The vote will be preceded by a referendum on a revised constitution in March 2023 and legislative elections in late 2023.

The ECOWAS mediator in Mali, former Nigerian leader Goodluck Jonathan, visited the country last week.

A member of his entourage told AFP Mali had made "enormous progress".

Mali's top diplomat Abdoulaye Diop on Friday said the recent political developments were moving the country towards a lifting of the sanctions.

Guinea transition 'unthinkable'

Burkina Faso – another Sahel country caught up in jihadist turmoil – and Guinea have so far only been suspended from the bodies of the 15-nation bloc but could face harsher sanctions.

Burkina Faso's junta has proposed a constitutional referendum in December 2024 and legislative and presidential elections in February 2025.

Visiting the Burkinabe capital of Ouagadougou for the second time in a month on Saturday, ECOWAS mediator Mahamadou Issoufou praised junta leader Lieutenant Colonel Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba and his government for their "openness to dialogue".

The timetable to enable a return to civilian rule and the situation of deposed leader Roch Marc Christian Kabore were also discussed, said the former president of Niger.

Burkina Faso has been battling Islamist militants active in the region, some with links to al-Qaeda and Islamic State, since 2015 https://t.co/J1iWQM7rEj

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Political parties allied to Kabore denounced the junta's plans on Friday, saying they were not consulted in advance.

The situation appears more complex in Guinea, whose junta has refused an ECOWAS mediator and announced a 36-month transition – a period that African Union chairman and Senegalese President Macky Sall has described as "unthinkable".

ECOWAS avoided ruling on sanctions at a 4 June meeting and instead gave itself another month to negotiate.

Guinea this week has led a diplomatic offensive to assuage the concerns of regional leaders.

The country's post-coup prime minister Mohamed Beavogui on Saturday met the United Nations' special representative for West Africa and the Sahel, Mahamat Saleh Annadif.

The government said it wanted to reassure its ECOWAS "brothers" of its commitment to undertaking a peaceful and inclusive democratic transition.

Guinea's military regime met the main political parties on Monday, but they have made their participation in the dialogue conditional on the nomination of an ECOWAS mediator.