Three West African nations under military rule—Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso—signed a confederation treaty on Saturday, demonstrating their will to forge on together outside of the regional political and economic bloc that has been pressuring them to revert to democratic governance.

The agreement, which occurred during the Alliance of Sahel States’ (AES) inaugural meeting, represents a closer alignment of the neighbours in the central Sahel region, which is riven by insurgency. In the three states between 2020 and 2023, juntas overthrew their governments through a series of coups and broke diplomatic and military ties with Western nations and regional allies.

The AES meeting was referred to be “the culmination of our determined common will to reclaim our national sovereignty” by General Abdourahamane Tiani, the head of Niger’s military.

The formalization of the confederation treaty validates Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso’s rejection of the 15-member Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). Its signature coincides with ECOWAS’s summit, which aims to convince the three to rethink their January decision to leave the union.

“Our peoples have irrevocably turned their backs on ECOWAS,” Tiani said in a speech. “It is up to us today to make the AES Confederation an alternative to any artificial regional group by building … a community free from the control of foreign powers.”

As it fights to limit a ten-year war with Islamist rebels and develop economies that are among the world’s poorest, it is unclear how closely the AES will coordinate political, economic, and defence objectives.

The three nations decided to form a combined force in March to address security challenges on their borders. The nations stated in a statement following the summit that they had decided to coordinate diplomatic efforts, establish an AES investment bank and stabilization fund, and combine their resources to launch initiatives in vital industries like mining, energy, and agriculture.

The heads of state “welcomed their irrevocable withdrawal without delay from ECOWAS,” it said.

ECOWAS has endeavoured diplomatically to discourage the trio of nations from abandoning the half-century-old relationship. Decades of regional integration will be reversed by the split, which also poses a risk of a messy detachment from trade and services flows worth around $150 billion annually.

The ECOWAS’s decision to impose harsh sanctions in response to the three coups and its unfulfilled threat to deploy force to restore constitutional government in Niger last year are linked to the falling out.

The regional group is under fire from Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso for allegedly betraying its core principles and providing insufficient backing to counter Islamist insurgencies that have resulted in thousands of fatalities and forced over 3 million more to from their homes.

The three governments are cultivating stronger defence, diplomatic, and commercial connections with Russia at the expense of former colonial power France, regional heavyweight Nigeria, and the United governments. These policy changes are the result of the juntas’ policies in the central Sahel.