Algerian President Abdel Majid Tebboune ordered the “immediate” return of his representative to his post in Niamey, the Nigerien capital, the Algerian Foreign Ministry announced.

The crisis erupted when Algerian air defenses shot down a drone controlled by Mali, a country that, along with Burkina Faso and Niger, formed the Alliance of Sahel States after leaving the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which it considered too accommodating to the interests of the former European colonial powers and the United States.

The tripartite entity is also united by the common thread of combating Islamist groups operating in their respective territories.

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