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The Niger government declared the termination of the headquarters agreement with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). It instructed the organization to shut down its offices in the country and promptly remove its foreign staff, as stated in a verbal note dated January 31.
In Niger, the Red Cross has been accused of conducting “activities that are inconsistent with our country’s vision of fighting for its sovereignty and independence,” Bana Ibrahim, a member of the Patriotic Front for Sovereignty, told Sputnik Africa.
According to him, it is among the NGOs “that have not understood the change that has taken place in our country.”
Bana Ibrahim highlighted the “shortcomings” of the ICRC, pointing to “cases of disappearance of trucks containing medicines.” He also mentioned that the NGO declined to adhere to the rule of having a military escort while conducting operations in specific conflict zones.
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“In the United States and France, one never sees the ICRC, in the name of any neutrality, siding with terrorists or rebels and treating them; it is only in Africa, and in Niger, that these organizations engage in such practices,” he said.
Bana Ibrahim believes the ICRC exercises a kind of “dictate” that must “cease.”
