Following an ECOWAS threat, Burkina Faso Mali deploys fighter jets.

Following the Economic Community of West Africa’s potential armed involvement to restore democracy in Niger Republic, Burkina Faso and Mali have sent warplanes to the country.

On Friday, a Niger television station stated that Mali and Burkina Faso were working together to support Niger and that jets had been sent within Niger’s borders.

“Mali and Burkina Faso turned their commitments into concrete action by deploying warplanes to respond to any attack on Niger,” it said, noting the planes were Super Tucano fighter jets.

President Mohamed Bazoum was detained on June 26 and the elected government of Niger, a significant uranium producer and partner of the West in the struggle against an Islamist insurgency, was overthrown.

On July 30, ECOWAS, headed by Nigerian President Bola Tinubu, resolved to impose sanctions on the Nigerian military members and ordered the military junta one week to reinstate Bazoum as president.

After the one-week ultimatum expired, West African leaders met on August 10 and approved a “standby force” to reinstate elected Bazoum.The coupists had called the bluff of ECOWAS and vowed to resist foreign intervention.

Subsequently, ECOWAS Defence Chiefs were ordered to activate the region’s force for action to restore civil rule in Niger, noting that it will invade the country on the “D-Day.”

Mali and Burkina Faso’s military regimes, however, called ECOWAS’s bluff and warned that any armed intervention in Niger would be met with force.

The military chiefs of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger met on Friday in Niamey, the nation’s capital, according to the news station, to decide on “concrete measures” in case ECOWAS decides to “escalate a war.”