President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has expressed concerns about Russian mercenaries’ activities on Ghana’s northern border with Burkina Faso.
President-Akufo-Addo who is in Washington for the US-Africa Leaders Summit raised the concerns at a meeting on Wednesday (December 14, 2022) with United States Secretary of State, Antony Blinken. This was contained in a statement released by the U.S. Department of State.
According to the President, Burkina Faso (Ghana’s neighbour to the north) had given Russian mercenaries working for the Wagner Group a mine as payment for their services.
“And I think that beyond everything, there is a matter that I want to urge upon you. Today, Russian mercenaries are on our northern border,” President Akufo-Addo said.
“Burkina Faso has now entered into an arrangement to go along with Mali in employing the Wagner forces there. I believe a mine in southern Burkina has been allocated to them as a form of payment for their services.
“The Prime minister of Burkina Faso in the last 10 days has been in Moscow. And to have them operating on our northern border is particularly distressing for us in Ghana”.
The President said he was particularly concerned about the activities of the Russian mercenaries because of Ghana’s very vocal condemnation of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
He added: “Apart from not accepting the idea of great powers once again making Africa their theatre of operation, we have a particular position that you know about over the Ukraine war, where we have been very, very vocal and upfront about condemning the invasion of Russia – by Russia. And therefore, there now to have this group within our borders is a matter of some considerable disquiet and concern for us. We’d really like to have a privileged opportunity to talk about its implications and what we believe ought to be the case”.
President Akufo-Addo further urged the US to partner with the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to protect countries in the region from armed groups that threatened democracy.
He said ECOWAS had been very consistent in refusing to deal with coup makers because of the undemocratic nature of their accession to power.
“This is what took place with the discussion in the Congress yesterday, which I found very fruitful. And I would like to – the themes of that discussion should be the themes that we should continue to address: to what extent we can have you as a partner in confronting these threats,” he said.
“It’s very important that ECOWAS and the West African area remains a democratic space. It’s the reason for the actions we took over the coup d’etats in Burkina Faso, in Mali, and in Guinea”.
