From New York Times, I'm Michael Bavaro, this is a daily.

Today, in a region known for rising authoritarianism and extremism, the African country of Niger

seemed to be on a different path of democracy and partnership with the United States.

My colleague, Declan Walsh, explains how a military coup has now put all of that in jeopardy,

and why Niger's allies still think it's possible to reverse that coup.

It's Wednesday, August 16th.

Second, we called you a couple of days ago to talk about a coup that had just occurred

in Africa, a not entirely uncommon occurrence on that continent.

And you told us, without much hesitation, that this coup has taken on global importance

in a way that's quite unique.

Yes, that's right.

I mean, it's no secret that coups have been common in Africa.

There's probably been a hundred in the post-interpenance period the last 60 years.

And in the region known as the Sahel, which is this huge zone that runs south to the Sahara

desert stretching across the continent, there's been five coups in the last three years alone.

And candidly, the world kind of shrugs when many of those coups happen.

But as you said, what happened in Niger in the last couple of weeks is very different.

It's been called a red line coup, a coup that the US and its European allies and several

major regional African countries have said that they cannot tolerate and they're now demanding

something very unusual they want it to be reversed.

Why is that?

Why are all these powerful countries so invested in and worried about this particular

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