Cape Town — France and Burkina Faso have officially marked the end of French military operations in the West African nation, the Burkinabe armed forces said. A flag-lowering ceremony at the French special forces’ camp took place on February 18, 2023.
This follows a request by the Burkinabe junta on January 26, 2023, for French soldiers to leave the country.
“We are terminating the agreement which allows French forces to be in Burkina Faso. This is not the end of diplomatic relations between Burkina Faso and France,” spokesperson Jean-Emmanuel Ouedraogo told the government controlled Radio-Television Burkina at the time.
Burkina Faso has since 2015, been grappling with a militant insurgency that killed thousands and displaced around two million people. France had 400 special forces soldiers stationed in Burkina Faso to battle insurgency, but relations deteriorated in recent months.
France also withdrew its Barkhane forces from Mali in 2022 after the junta there allegedly worked with Wagner, a Russian military contractor.
At that time, Ghana accused Burkina Faso of hiring mercenaries from Russia’s Wagner Group, prompting Burkina Faso’s interim president to deny such forces were in the country.
French President Emmanuel Macron described Russia’s influence in troubled African countries as “predatory”, reports Voice of America.
While the withdrawal of the French troops raises concerns over the growing presence of terror groups in the region, the junta has recruited 50,000 armed civilian auxiliaries to join the Volunteers for the Defense of the Homeland (VDP), to fight the violent extremists currently occupying nearly half of the country. The recruitment campaign, launched in October 2022 by Burkina Faso’s authorities after the September 30 coup, ended on November 18.