Ecowas to send troops to Guinea-Bissau
Friday February 04 2022
A soldier in Bissau on March 10, 2009. Ecowas says it will send a stabilisation force to Guinea-Bissau following a failed coup attempt in the country. PHOTO | AFP
The Economic Community for the Development of West African States (Ecowas) will send stabilisation force to Guinea-Bissau following the Monday ‘failed coup attempt’, the bloc has announced.
The decision was made Thursday during an extraordinary session held in Accra, Ghana.
Read: West African leaders hold emergency summit after spate of coups
Apart from the situation in Guinea Bissau, the meeting also assessed the situation in Burkina Faso, Guinea-Conakry and Mali.
According to the Ecowas communiqué, the mission to be deployed to Guinea-Bissau, composed of military and police, will be deployed from The Gambia, where a stationary force of the organisation has been located since the elections that removed Yaya Jammeh from power in 2017.
The last Ecowas stabilisation mission in Guinea-Bissau was deployed between 2012 and 2020, and the troops left the country after President Umaro Sissoco Embaló was inaugurated. At the time, President Embaló said he did not need the “foreign force” and that he trusted the country´s army.
Meanwhile, Guinea Bissau Public Prosecutor's Office has compiled a list of 20 people allegedly involved in the ‘failed coup attempt’ Monday, VOA Radio reported Thursday quoting a source who asked not to be named.
Interior ministry senior officials, leaders of the country´s main opposition party PAIGC, and army personnel allegedly linked to former navy chief of staff José Américo Bubu Na Tchutu, are among the involved, VOA report added.