US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin stressed that “the Russians are in a separate compound and have no access to US forces or our equipment”
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The United States Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin confirmed that Russian security forces were deployed at the same air base of US troops in Nigerian capital, Niamey.
It is unclear when Russian troops, which they have been in Niger for weekswere deployed to Air Base 101, which is located next to Niamey’s Diori Hamani International Airport. The number is not even clear of Russian troops present on the ground.
But “the Russians are in a separate complex and they have no access to US forces or our equipment“, Austin specified in a press conference in Honolulu.
In response to the “revelation”, the Kremlin spokesman on Friday Dmitry Peskov told reporters in Moscow that Russia “is developing ties with various African countries in all sectors, including the military.”
Until July last year, Niger had been a key partners for Washington in the Sahel. But after the coup that overthrew elected president Mohamed Bazoum, the military regime in March branded the military cooperation agreement with the US as “unilaterally imposed” and presence of American troops as “illegal”.
Mid-April Washington agreed to withdraw its more than a thousand troops from the country, with the collection methods still being defined. At the same time Russian instructors have arrived in Niamey while the country’s authorities received the first delivery of military equipment from Moscow.
Last December the Nigerian junta had already forced the French troops to pack their bagswhile Italy maintains its military contingent.
