FILE PHOTO: Canada's Foreign Minister Melanie Joly delivers her speeches in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Post Ministerial Conference with Canada during the ASEAN Foreign Ministers' meeting in Jakarta, on July 13, 2023.  BAY ISMOYO/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo
Canada

In response to coup, Canada suspends aid to Niger

Canada will suspend direct development assistance to the government of Niger in response to the attempted coup d’état in the West African nation, the federal government said on Saturday.

(Reuters) - Canada will suspend direct development assistance to the government of Niger in response to the attempted coup d’état in the West African nation, the federal government said on Saturday.

A military junta overthrew Niger's democratically elected President Mohamed Bazoum and his government on July 26, the seventh military takeover in less than three years in West and Central Africa.

West African defence chiefs have drawn up a plan for military action if Niger's coup is not overturned by Sunday.

“Canada stands with the international community and expresses its support to the ECOWAS mediation efforts for the return of constitutional order in Niger. The democratically elected government must be reinstated immediately,” Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs Melanie Joly said in a statement.

The suspension will encompass Canada’s direct budgetary support to the Government of Niger, the statement added.

(Reporting by Jyoti Narayan in Bengaluru; editing by Jonathan Oatis)

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