AES Confederation: Administrative staff working to consolidate Year 2 in Ouagadougou
Since this Tuesday, February 24, 2026, the Burkinabe capital has been hosting a meeting of great importance for the future of the confederal space. For several days, senior officials from Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger are gathered to lay the groundwork for the second year of the Confederation of Sahel States (AES), ahead of the meeting of ministers tasked with examining their proposals.
It was under the leadership of Bassolma BAZIE, President of the national AES commission and head of the Burkinabe delegation, that the work was officially launched.
The objective assigned to these high-level experts is clear: to develop a roadmap for year 2 that is both realistic and ambitious, taking into account the security and geopolitical realities prevailing in the region.
This roadmap, representing the true strategic orientations of the Confederation, does not emerge from nowhere.
It is the result of work capitalizing on the experiences of the institution’s first year of existence.
The experts present in Ouagadougou will thus scrutinize the achievements gained since July 2024, while identifying areas requiring adjustments or new ambitions.
“We must come together to jointly evaluate the substance of the document and determine the relevant elements to integrate into it, in the form of priority projects,” explained the head of the Burkinabe delegation, emphasizing the institutional mechanism whereby this technical work is subsequently transmitted to the ministerial level, before landing on the table of heads of state for final validation.
The stakes are high: it involves transforming grand declarations of intent into concrete actions on the ground.
Once adopted, this roadmap must be implemented by all ministerial departments of the three brother countries.
The presence of the Malian and Nigerien delegations alongside their Burkinabe counterparts guarantees a collegial and consensual approach, a guarantee of the future effectiveness of common policies.
Since its creation on July 6, 2024, the AES Confederation has been built around three fundamental pillars: defense and security, diplomacy, and endogenous development.
The Ouagadougou meeting fits perfectly within this logic: it is about technicians proposing operational mechanisms to strengthen the pooling of efforts in the fight against insecurity, refine a common diplomacy on the international stage, and accelerate development projects conceived by and for Sahelian populations.
At the conclusion of these consultations, a consolidated document, reflecting the common vision of the highest authorities of the confederation, will be submitted to the hierarchy.
Another step forward on the path to regional integration and shared sovereignty.
