Question 16981 — foreign policy

Summary

Mr. Antoine Valentin draws the attention of the Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs to the accelerated deterioration of the security situation in the Sahel and its implications for French interests. Since the withdrawal of French forces from Mali in 2022, Burkina Faso then Niger in 2023 and the American evacuation of the Agadez drone base in 2024, the region is experiencing a new phase of jihadist expansion documented by the main conflict monitoring organizations. According to ACLED data compiled by International Crisis Group, JNIM, the Sahel branch of Al-Qaeda, has been involved in 16,023 violent incidents since 2017, causing nearly 40,000 deaths in Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, Benin and Togo. The Sahel Province of the Islamic State, for its part, has crossed a new threshold illustrated by the attack on Niamey airport in January 2026, then by that of the Tahoua military airport in March 2026. These operations combine skills (extended advance surveillance, mortar fire support, commercial drones with thermal vision), demonstrating a transfer of know-how between provinces of the organization. This dynamic raises direct questions for French interests. France retains nationals, businesses and partners in the countries coastal areas now exposed to jihadist expansion: Ivory Coast, Benin, Togo, Senegal. The JNIM claimed its first armed action in Nigeria in November 2025 and has carried out attacks in the northern areas of Ivory Coast, Benin and Togo since 2019. Furthermore, according to information reported by the journal Conflits citing ACLED data, a delegation from the Nigerien regime secretly met with executives of the JNIM in March 2026, suggesting a recomposition of political alliances which would directly affect the regional security environment. Finally, the growing presence of the Russian Africa Corps in the three countries of the Alliance of Sahel States, Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger, constitutes an additional factor in the reduction of French influence and the complexity of the strategic landscape. He asks him to specify what reading the Government made of the evolution of the jihadist threat in the Sahel since the French withdrawals of 2022-2023, particularly with regard to the capacity building of the Sahel Province of the Islamic State and the geographical extension of the JNIM towards the coastal countries and whether this reading gave rise to a formal reassessment of the French strategy in the region. He also asks what concrete measures the Government has taken or intends to take to protect French nationals, businesses and institutional partners in the coastal countries of West Africa now exposed to this threat, by specifying the state of diplomatic dialogue with these countries and the security cooperation arrangements maintained. Finally, he asks whether France still has sufficient intelligence capabilities to monitor operational dynamics in real time in a region from which it was militarily expelled and whether a multilateral framework is envisaged to fill the strategic vacuum left by successive Western withdrawals.

Machine translation from French. The official text remains authoritative.

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