text:  Well, Ulf Leising is head of the Sahel program at the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung in Mali. And I asked him to tell us more about the thinking behind this new regional grouping. They see themselves on a course against France, against the West African bloc ECOWAS. And they want to show that they are serious by meeting for the first time, bringing together the three presidents from Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, just to give a countersign to ECOWAS.