What were the highlights, key points, priorities and notable excerpts and quotes in Lamine Zeine Ali Mahaman's speech at the UN General Assembly?

Zeine spoke on behalf of General Abdourahamane Tiani, Niger's head of state, and opened in the name of "the sovereign people of Niger, a people that is committed to its dignity and to cooperation among nations."

Highlights

• Trust cannot be built on broken promises. Zeine opened with a direct challenge to the session's theme of "restoring trust," arguing that trust is not built through "more and more promises but rather through their effective implementation for the benefit of the peoples." He argued that propaganda has kept Africa falsely dependent, while its resources are "stolen and locked away for the benefit of other agendas." (02:47)

• Palestine, Libya, Iraq: a pattern of unpunished crimes. He listed crimes committed "in Libya, in Iraq, in Palestine, in Lebanon, in Cuba, in Venezuela, and in our Sahel" in the name of universal values, calling them unpunished while sovereign nations face sanctions "for simply having wanted to decide on their own fate." Niger called for a two-state solution, the protection of civilians in Gaza, and unhindered humanitarian access. (03:44)

• Africa's permanent seat on the Security Council. He called Africa's exclusion from a permanent Security Council seat "a historic anomaly" and reaffirmed Niger's support for the Ezulwini Consensus, the African Union position that the continent deserves at least two permanent seats, demanding it become "subject to a full and concrete decision" rather than "sterile debates repeated day after day." (04:57)

• The Sahel is in a war of liberation, not a war of religion. The most politically charged section. Zeine argued that what outsiders call terrorism in the Sahel is "the cynical machinery of recolonization dressed in the trappings of extremism," driven by desire for Niger's uranium, Mali and Burkina Faso's gold, lithium, gas and oil. He named Emmanuel Macron's France by name, accusing it of using "local proxies, networks, and complicity" and of conducting destabilization with "the active complicity of Ukraine." He also said that as he spoke, proxies on Niger's northeastern border were "about to attack our military positions and our oil installations." (06:06)

• The AES: an irreversible confederation. Zeine gave a detailed institutional account of the Alliance of Sahel States (AES), the confederation grouping Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, formed after all three countries expelled French forces and left the West African regional bloc ECOWAS. He described it as "an irreversible process towards our countries' sovereignty" and catalogued its structures: a unified force of 5,000 troops (scalable to 15,000), a confederation investment and development bank, a biometric passport, shared media, and, most recently, the first meetings of a Confederation Parliament held in Niamey. (10:02)

• Niger foiled a coup attempt, and is investigating outside links. Zeine disclosed that on the night of August 28 to 29, a third attempt at destabilization targeted Niger's institutions, after two previous attacks on Diori Hamani International Airport in Niamey. He said it failed "thanks to the loyalty of our defense and security forces" and that Niger reserves the right under the UN Gourma Charter to pursue "competent mechanisms to defend its sovereignty" once investigations into internal and external support are complete. (17:39)

• Uranium now belongs to Niger. He announced that Niger has recovered control of Somaïr, the uranium mine formerly operated for decades by French nuclear company Orano, nationalized in June 2025. He declared: "For more than half a century, Niger's uranium has lit the cities of Europe while our cities have remained in darkness. That injustice is now over." He said Niger invested 30 billion CFA francs to maintain production using entirely Nigerien workers and experts, and that the uranium will now be sold on the international market "in full transparency." (19:48)

• Economic Community results: 7% growth, deflation, food self-sufficiency. Zeine cited concrete numbers: 7% economic growth driven by oil and agriculture, inflation falling from 9.1% to negative 4.7%, a large-scale irrigation program covering 22,000 hectares of new farmland, a 50% reduction in public healthcare costs with free childbirth and pediatric care, and free and mandatory public education. He said Niger had not faced food shortages or called upon foreign assistance "for the first time in decades." (22:56)

• Algeria, China, Russia and others named as true friends. Closing with gratitude, he named Togo, Turkey, the Kingdom of Morocco, the Russian Federation, and the People's Republic of China as partners "based on mutual respect," thanking them on behalf of President Tiani. (26:52)

Priorities

• Sovereignty over Niger's natural resources, particularly uranium and oil, managed by and for Nigerians
• Full institutional consolidation of the AES confederation, including its parliament, joint military force, and development bank
• African permanent membership on the UN Security Council
• A just and lasting peace in Palestine through a two-state solution
• Economic transformation financed by Niger's own resources, not foreign aid
• Reform of the UN to ensure equal treatment of all member states, large and small

In his own words

On trust and Africa's place in the world: "Trust cannot be decreed. It is built. It is earned. And it requires truth and justice."

"How to restore trust when for decades propaganda has been used to maintain the idea of a poor Africa condemned to do everything it is told to do, to survive thanks to the assistance of supposed international generosity even while its resources, its riches are stolen and locked away for the benefit of other agendas."

"How to restore this trust when the international institutions that are supposed to protect us have become the tools of a world order in which some peoples count and others merely survive and in which international law does not apply equally to all."

On Palestine: "Niger is following with deep concern the tragic situation in Palestine, particularly in Gaza, where civilians are paying an unbearable human cost. We call for the effective protection of civilian populations, for unhindered humanitarian access, and for the pursuit of just and lasting peace."

"Niger reaffirms its support for a two-state solution, allowing the state of Palestine and the state of Israel to live side by side in peace, security and dignity."

On the Security Council: "How to restore trust when 81 years after San Francisco, Africa with its more than around one and a half billion inhabitants and its 54 states still does not have a single permanent seat on the Security Council."

"Niger reaffirms its commitment to the Ezulwini Consensus and calls for this historic anomaly to no longer be the subject of sterile debates repeated day after day, to at long last become subject to a full and concrete decision."

On the Sahel conflict and France: "Our Sahel is at war. It is in a war of liberation against a conspiracy aimed at recolonizing it."

"What some call terrorism in our region is the cynical machinery of recolonization dressed in the trappings of extremism. But the real motivation lies elsewhere, in a covetousness for the significant resources that God has placed in our land."

"They want to make us believe that we are incapable of governing ourselves, incapable of producing, of thinking, and of defending ourselves."

"This perfidious attempt to destabilize the central Sahel, conducted by France with the active complicity of Ukraine, is now documented, widely documented."

"I say solemnly from this rostrum: the Sahel sees, the Sahel hears, the Sahel remembers, and the Sahel understands things very well."

"A people that has decided to be free cannot be recolonized through fear, through deceit, nor even through savage violence."

"As I speak to you, on our northeastern border, there are proxies led by that France, supported by Ukraine and two other countries. And you know which countries I'm alluding to. Those proxies are armed, managed, and led, and they are about to attack our military positions and our oil installations."

On the AES: "The AES is to Africa, its historic and contemporary diasporas, as light is to darkness."

"It is a profound, lasting, irrepressible and irreversible change. A change which, by trimming the sharp claws of imperialism, abolishing the trade in black persons and slavery, overthrowing colonialism and neocolonialism, is bringing the peoples of Africa towards independence, sovereignty and liberty."

"One space, one people, one destiny."

On Niger's sovereignty and resources: "Our refoundation in Niger is not targeted against anyone. It is an expression of our will to rely on ourselves, to have total control over our resources, and also responsibility for our choices and our alliances."

"The sovereignty of our states is not negotiable. Our resources belong to our peoples. Our future will no longer be decided elsewhere."

"For more than half a century, Niger's uranium has lit the cities of Europe while our cities have remained in darkness. That injustice is now over. It is at an end."

"Not a single foreigner was involved in that. The current stock belongs to our country. It does not belong to anyone, and we will sell it to all those who wish to buy, in total transparency."

On Niger's economic progress: "Three years after breaking with the old order, progress on the ground is remarkable. Our economy has seen 7% growth in 2025, driven above all by oil and agriculture."

"These results are very encouraging despite the scale of the challenges, because they are our results that we have achieved through our own means and resources."

On Niger standing tall: "Three years ago, some people predicted that Niger would collapse under the weight of sanctions and isolation. Today, Niger is standing tall."

"It is standing tall because its people has refused to bow down."

On what trust requires: "We declare that trust will be reborn when every nation, big or small, is treated with the same consideration, when the right to sovereign equality, to territorial integrity, to freely choose one's partners, and to non-interference, when those rights are respected."

"No country, however powerful it may be, can claim to be the world's policeman. That time is over."

Worth knowing

The AES, or Alliance des États du Sahel, is the confederation grouping Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso, all three governed by military juntas that came to power through coups. It began as a mutual-defense pact signed in September 2023 under the Liptako-Gourma Charter, then upgraded into a full confederation in July 2024. Its stated long-term goal is federalizing into a single sovereign state. The confederation has moved unusually fast by the standards of African regional integration: a joint biometric passport, a unified military command initially set at 5,000 troops, a confederation bank, shared television and radio, and, most recently, a Confederation Parliament installed in Niamey with 45 lawmakers, 15 from each member state.

The Somaïr mine, now renamed and transferred to state company TSUMCO, was for decades operated by French nuclear group Orano (formerly Areva), which held a 63% stake. Niger nationalized it in June 2025 after accusing Orano of extracting more uranium than permitted. Orano has pursued international arbitration. The mine at Arlit in northern Niger is one of the world's significant uranium operations, and its output powered European nuclear plants for generations while, as Zeine put it, Nigerien cities stayed dark.

The coup attempt Zeine referenced took place on the night of August 28 to 29. Mutinous soldiers attacked sensitive sites in Niamey including the airport and the Presidential Palace. It was the third security incident targeting the airport in 2026 alone: the first, in January, was carried out by the Islamic State Sahel Province; the second, in June, was claimed by JNIM (Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin), an al-Qaeda affiliate. Niger's government said the August coup attempt was repelled by loyal forces and allies, and investigations into who supported it internally and externally are ongoing. Russia's Africa Corps was reported to have assisted in putting it down.

The Ezulwini Consensus is the African Union's official position on UN Security Council reform, first adopted in 2005. It calls for Africa to receive at least two permanent seats with veto rights and five non-permanent seats, arguing that Africa is the only major world region with no permanent voice in the body that decides matters of war and peace.

Kwame Nkrumah (Ghana's first president and pan-Africanist icon) and Haile Selassie (Emperor of Ethiopia) were both invoked in the speech's broader pan-African framing, as founding figures of the anti-colonial movement whose vision Zeine presented the AES as continuing.

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