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Protesters hold a Niger flag during an Independence Day demonstration in Niamey, August 3, 2023.
CNN –
The US State Department is preparing to formally label the military takeover in Niger a coup as early as next week, three US officials told CNN, a decision that could have a dramatic impact on the US’s ability to cooperate with a crucial state Partner in the fight against terrorism in the region.
The ministry will announce that the U.S. will suspend certain forms of aid to Niger because of the coup attempts, an official and another person familiar with the discussion said.
The U.S. Embassy can continue to operate and the U.S. military can legally keep its troops in Niger if there is an attempted coup, U.S. officials said. But the Pentagon is still assessing how the change will affect the roughly 1,000 U.S. forces stationed in the country, officials said.
U.S. officials said it was unlikely that U.S. forces would fully withdraw and some would likely take a more limited intelligence-gathering role.
“As we continue our diplomatic engagements to uphold civilian rule in Niger, we continue to consider additional next steps but have no prospects at this time,” a State Department spokesperson said.
A Pentagon spokesman declined to comment.
The government could continue to provide life-saving and other types of assistance important to U.S. security interests while suspending other assistance to the government, including economic and security assistance. These details are still being clarified.
Nigerian military leaders overthrew democratically elected President Mohamed Bazoum in July. But unlike some allies, the U.S. was reluctant to officially call the takeover a “coup,” because that is a legal designation that would require the U.S. to restrict certain forms of foreign aid to Niger – particularly funding Security assistance to Niger Nigerian Armed Forces.
The coup plot could result in a halt to U.S. funding and support for the Nigerian military, something the U.S. military has tried to avoid — even though France announced last week that it would suspend all of its funding until the coup attempt ends Troops will be withdrawn from the country this year. The U.S. has worked for a decade to support Nigerian forces to strengthen its fight against terrorists in Africa’s Sahel, and the U.S. has several bases in Niger from which it conducts counterterrorism operations.
According to the U.S. Embassy in Niamey, since 2012, the Pentagon and State Department have “provided more than $350 million in military assistance equipment and training programs to Niger – one of the largest security assistance and training programs in sub-Saharan Africa.”
However, U.S. law requires that funding appropriated by Congress to train and equip a foreign military force be limited in the event that a country’s “duly elected” leader is overthrown by that country’s military.
“There was frustration in Congress over the administration’s lack of communication with the Hill and the administration’s slow decision-making process,” said a person familiar with the discussions.
Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in Djibouti last week that the U.S. still has “essentially the same footprint in Niger” as it did before the takeover and continues to conduct intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance missions to protect U.S. forces still stationed there. However, he said the US had “not resumed operations with the Nigerian Armed Forces.”
The US military mission in Niger is one of the main reasons the US hesitated for so long to legally declare the situation a military coup and instead used extensive diplomacy to try to reverse the Nigerian military’s takeover, officials previously told CNN. But these diplomatic efforts were unsuccessful and the military is still in power.
“We came very close to saying again that this was an attempted coup,” Pentagon deputy press secretary Sabrina Singh said on August 15 when asked why the US had not made the legal designation. “I think that we at the State Department, the Defense Department and other levels of government are definitely trying to deal with this in a peaceful way. “As you know, Niger is a very important partner for us in the region.”
According to the Congressional Research Service, the secretary of state could issue a waiver to reinstate military aid once a coup has been determined, but only if he decides it is in the national security interest of the United States and first consults with Congress. Congress included the waiver in its 2023 general spending bill for the first time last year.
Senior Pentagon officials believe maintaining a presence in Niger is critical to counterterrorism efforts in the region and believe it is feasible even given the domestic political turmoil there. Several of the junta leaders have worked with and been trained by the U.S. as part of U.S. security cooperation with the country, current and former officials told CNN, and Nigeria’s military leaders have neither expressed anti-American sentiment nor called for the U.S. to withdraw.