Cooperation between the EU and Niger as part of the targeted partnership on migration is working and must be strengthened, according to both parties, who stated this during the visit of Niger's President Mahamadou Issoufou and Minister of Planning Aïchatou Boulama Kané to the European institutions in Brussels on Thursday 15 December. Their visit was at the invitation of High Representative of the EU for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini.
During their time in Brussels, European Commissioner for International Cooperation and Development Neven Mimica and Boulama Kané signed a €30 million financial commitment on "Support to Niger's Justice, Security and Border Management" (AJUSEN), financed by the emergency trust fund for Africa.
Niger is one of the first to benefit from this €2.4 billion trust fund (which comes from the EU budget and from the European Development Fund, and currently from €81.5 million from member state contributions).
Nine projects, for a total of €139 million, were approved in 2016 in line with the commitments taken by the EU and Niger under the Valletta action plan. These projects are aimed at combating human trafficking and smuggling, improving border management, and tackling the root cause of migration, especially by offering economic alternatives to the systems that currently depend on irregular migration. Three of these nine projects were approved on Wednesday 14 December, for a maximum of €35 million, to facilitate the return and reintegration of irregular migrants while ensuring protection of the weakest.
Mimica also said that the EU had approved the disbursement of €10.7 million in budgetary aid to the government of Niger for 2016 from the 11th EDF for Niger (€596 million for 2014-2020). In addition, he announced the EU's intention to contribute to financing a project to build a hybrid power station in Agadez (a feasibility study is underway).
In a joint statement adopted at the end of their meeting, the EU hailed Niger's excellent cooperation on combating irregular migration, and its determination to take action against criminal smuggler networks and corruption. The initial results on this are encouraging and should be continued, the statement says. The number of people crossing the desert fell from 70,000 in May to 1,500 in November, 102 smugglers have been sent to court, and 95 vehicles have been seized. The two parties underlined the importance of continuing and of consolidating these efforts in order to halt the action of the smuggler networks and human trafficking. The EU reiterated its support for the action for voluntary returns of migrants and their reintegration in their country of origin. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)