Speaking at UN headquarters, Dr. Touray revealed that early-warning systems recorded 450 terrorist attacks and over 1,900 deaths across the region in 2025 alone, a sharp escalation that shows the threat is spreading rapidly southward and westward.

Terrorist groups are deliberately waging “economic warfare,” blocking fuel supplies, destroying markets, and strangling cross-border trade, plunging communities into deeper poverty and instability.

In response, ECOWAS is fast-tracking the deployment of its long-planned regional standby force, with an initial 1,650 troops set to mobilise immediately, scaling up to a full 5,000-strong contingent as funding and logistics are secured with international partners.

Dr. Touray told the Security Council that fragmented national responses and lingering mistrust between states are hampering the fight, and called on the UN to help restore confidence, guarantee predictable financing, and reinforce coordinated regional action before the crisis spirals further out of control.

“The threat is here, it is real, and it is at all our doors,” he warned. “West Africa will not wait – we are acting now.”