The European Union has summoned Burkina Faso’s ambassador in Brussels in protest at the expulsion of two diplomats from its delegation in the Burkinabe capital Ouagadougou. It has warned that retaliatory measures would follow.
Léopold Tonguenoma Bonkoungou, who has represented Burkina Faso to the EU since June 2024, was called in on July 16, two days after the expulsion order.
EU foreign affairs spokeswoman Anitta Hipper said the bloc had received no explanation for what she called an unjustified decision. “The ambassador has been summoned, and retaliatory measures will follow,” she wrote on social media.
Hipper gave no detail of what the measures might involve.
The Burkinabe authorities declared the pair persona non grata on July 14 and gave them three days to leave. They are the deputy head of the EU delegation, who also runs its political, press and information section, and a programme officer, according to the state news agency AIB.
Neither has been named publicly and the Burkinabe Government has not commented on the decision.
Relations between Brussels and Ouagadougou soured after the European Parliament adopted a resolution on June 18 condemning what it called the continued crackdown on civic space and fundamental freedoms in the country.
The text passed by 476 votes to 11, with 75 abstentions. It was tabled jointly by the European People’s Party, the Socialists and Democrats, the European Conservatives and Reformists, Renew Europe and the Greens.
French MEP Christophe Gomart, a former head of French military intelligence who is now vice-chair of the security and defence subcommittee, steered it through. Speaking in the chamber, he called the military government’s record since 2022 a dramatic failure and said more than half the country lay outside State control.
Burkinabe foreign minister Karamoko Jean-Marie Traoré summoned the EU ambassador, Philippe Bronchain, on June 22 over the resolution and Gomart’s remarks, which his ministry described as accusatory, crude and untruthful.
The expulsions follow Burkina Faso’s decision on June 26 to sever diplomatic relations with France, which it accused of neo-colonial ambitions and of backing the jihadist groups behind years of violence. Paris confirmed on July 6 that all its diplomats had left.
