Niger's National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland (CNSP) on Friday accused French President Emmanuel Macron of trying to force the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to invade Niger.
On Monday, Macron said that France condemned the United States and other countries' refusal to support civil Nigerien authorities and that Paris would continue to back ousted Nigerien President Mohamed Bazoum and ECOWAS diplomatic and military efforts.
"[Macron's statements] are aimed at comparing African leaders to children by escalating, without taking into account the differences between national contexts, psychosis, regarding the regional threat of the spread of military putsches. [Macron] hopes to scare them and use them as an ECOWAS tool to force them to join a neo-colonialist project from another era to invade Niger," the CNSP said in a statement.
The Nigerien national council called Macron's remarks "another case of interference" into Niger's internal affairs.
At the same time, Macron said that Paris would not make any decisions regarding the situation in Niger without negotiations with Bazoum, adding that he was in daily contact with the ousted Nigerien leader.
"The decisions we make, whatever they might be, we make only on the basis of negotiations with President Bazoum," Macron told reporters, as quoted by French newspaper La Provence.
A coup took place in Niger on July 26. Bazoum was ousted and detained by his own guard, led by Gen. Abdourahmane Tchiani. Following the coup, ECOWAS suspended all cooperation with Niger and threatened an invasion if the rebels do not reinstate Bazoum.
In early August, during a summit in the Nigerian capital of Abuja, ECOWAS leaders agreed to activate a standby force to potentially compel the Nigerien military to reinstate Bazoum. On August 18, ECOWAS Commissioner for Political Affairs Abdel-Fatau Musah said the bloc's chiefs of staff had agreed on a date for an invasion of Niger, but would not make it public.