Algeria will send troops into Niger, its first deployment abroad since 1973, to guard Sonatrach’s oil interests at Madama

CAIRO — Algeria is preparing to send soldiers into Niger. It will be the first time since 1973 that Algerian troops have deployed outside the country, and it marks a break with a military doctrine that for half a century kept the army inside its own borders.

President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, who is also commander-in-chief and defence minister, decided on Monday to deploy units of the People’s National Army to Niger “to protect the common energy and economic interests of Algeria and Niger”, the presidency said in a statement carried by the state news agency APS. The presidency said the authorities in Niamey had asked for the help, Al Jazeera reported. The order followed a closed emergency session on Sunday in which both chambers of parliament approved it. The Council of the Nation, the upper house, passed it unanimously, 148 votes to none, against the 116 required under the constitution, BBC Afrique reported.

Where they are going

The resolution authorised a deployment to Madama in northern Niger, near the Libyan border, according to Reuters reporting carried by Arab News. The French defence site Zone Militaire, citing Jeune Afrique, said the detachment was expected to set up at the former forward operating base that French forces used there during Operation Barkhane, about 100 km from the Libyan frontier. Neither government has said how many soldiers will go or when they will arrive.

Senator Belkacem Boulghiti said after the vote that Algeria was “not sending our soldiers to wage war in Niger”, describing the mission as one to “secure economic infrastructure”, according to Al Jazeera.

Oil, gas and a fast thaw

The interests in question are mainly Sonatrach’s. The state energy company is exploring the Kafra block in northern Niger, about 85 km from the Algerian border, with Niger’s Sonidep under a 2022 production-sharing contract, BBC Afrique reported. Agence Ecofin said two exploration wells there were associated with estimated reserves of 168 million and 100 million barrels. Algeria is also working with Niger and Nigeria on the Trans-Saharan Gas Pipeline, which would carry Nigerian gas through Niger to Algeria for export to Europe. Ecofin noted that nothing published so far says the troops will guard the pipeline route.

The deployment caps a rapid turnaround. Relations collapsed in April 2025, when Algeria shot down a Malian drone near the border and Niger, Mali and Burkina Faso recalled their ambassadors. Niger’s leader, General Abdourahamane Tiani, visited Algiers in February. In August Algeria handed Niger four military helicopters and then sent four Su-30 fighter jets and an Il-78 tanker to Niamey after what it called an attempt to destabilise the government there. On 21 October the two armies’ chiefs signed a military cooperation protocol in Algiers whose terms have not been published. “We will protect Niger whatever happens,” Tebboune told Algerian media earlier this month, BBC Afrique reported (AB24 translation).

Not everyone in Algiers is comfortable. The small reformist party Jil Jadid, which holds three seats in the lower house, asked the government to set out the limits of the mission. “The legitimacy of the objective never removes the need to define precisely the means committed, the limits of the mission and the conditions for ending it,” it said, according to BBC Afrique (AB24 translation).

AB24’s reading: Algeria is putting troops on the ground in a Sahel state that has expelled French and US forces and works with Russia’s Africa Corps. Watch for the size of the force when it is announced, how Mali, Niger’s partner in the Alliance of Sahel States, responds, and whether the mission stays limited to guarding oil sites.

Sources: APS / Presidency of Algeria, 26 Oct 2026; Al Jazeera (with Reuters), 26 Oct 2026; Al Jazeera explainer, 26 Oct 2026; Arab News (Reuters), 26 Oct 2026; BBC Afrique, Oct 2026; Zone Militaire, 26 Oct 2026; Agence Ecofin, 28 Oct 2026.

— AB24 · Cairo