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Burkina Faso has freed 11 Nigerian soldiers detained after making an emergency landing on Burkinabe territory, after Nigeria sent an envoy to apologise for violating the junta-ruled country’s airspace.
The crew of a Nigerian Air Force C-130 made what the military said was a “precautionary landing” in the Burkinabe city of Bobo-Dioulasso on December 8 due to a technical problem.
This happened a day after Nigerian fighter jets helped thwart a coup attempt in neighbouring Benin, creating regional tension.
Burkina Faso’s military government and its allies condemned the entry into Burkinabe airspace as an unfriendly act, and the crew had been held ever since.
Kimiebi Imomotimi Ebienfa, Nigerian foreign ministry spokesman, told AFP that the detained Nigerian Military aircraft and 11 crew members in Bobo-Dioulasso, Burkina Faso, have been released.
A statement from Traore’s office said that Nigeria regrets the irregularities in the authorisation procedure for entering Burkina Faso’s airspace and that Tuggar had offered Abuja’s apologies for the incident.
The landing of the turboprop plane had drawn a stern response from the Alliance of Sahel States, comprising Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso, which said their air forces were on maximum alert and authorised to “neutralise any aircraft” violating the bloc’s airspace.
The three Sahel nations, all under military rule and facing long-running jihadist insurgencies, maintain tense relations with neighbouring West African countries, including Nigeria.
In January, they withdrew from ECOWAS after forming their own alliance.
