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Jevans Nyabiage

China has placed its nationals on high alert following a series of rebel attacks targeting the US$4.5 billion Niger-Benin oil pipeline and an Islamic State raid on the Nigerien capital’s international airport on January 29.
On Monday, the Chinese embassy in Niamey urged citizens to avoid high-risk areas and instructed firms to implement emergency response plans as insurgent groups increasingly target Chinese-managed infrastructure.
The warning follows recent attacks on the pipeline and a predawn assault on Air Base 101 and Niamey International Airport by Islamic State militants, who damaged several aircraft before being repelled with assistance from Russia’s Africa Corps.
The 1,980km (1,230-mile) pipeline to transport oil from landlocked Niger’s Agadem oilfields to Seme, an Atlantic port in Benin and operated by China’s CNPC, has become a major target for rebels seeking to choke off the military junta’s key revenue source.
While ambassador Lu Guijun pledged Beijing’s utmost support to safeguard “overseas compatriots”, the escalating violence is severely testing China’s traditional policy of non-interference in the face of mounting strategic and financial risks.
China finds itself in the dilemma of either changing its non-interference diplomatic policy to safeguard its massive energy investments or risking a withdrawal from a costly project after years of investment.
The rebel Patriotic Liberation Front (FPL) in Niger seeks the release and restoration of ousted President Mohamed Bazoum. Its splinter faction, the Patriotic Movement for Freedom and Justice (MPLJ), targets CNPC infrastructure in the Agadem oilfields over the lack of development for local nomadic clans.
The project is plagued by a volatile mix of diplomatic friction and security threats. Shortly after its 2024 launch, Benin blocked oil loading at the Seme terminal to force the reopening of the border, which had closed when General Abdourahamane Tchiani seized power in 2023.
This triggered mediation by the Chinese foreign ministry and CNPC executives, which enabled oil ships to sail, but tensions between the company and the junta remain high.


Folahanmi Aina, a Sahel expert and lecturer at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, suggested the rebel groups do not necessarily view Chinese infrastructure as an ideological threat. Instead, the groups treat the CNPC-backed Niger-Benin pipeline as a strategic pressure point.
“The pipeline is the junta’s most significant revenue-generating asset; therefore, targeting it is a rational strategy to undermine state capacity, erode elite cohesion, and signal that the military cannot guarantee economic security,” Aina said. “It is both a symbolic and economic target and less about China per se, and more about constraining the junta’s fiscal lifeline.”
Beyond direct revenue loss, he argued that prolonged instability raised insurance premiums, increased operational costs and complicated Beijing’s broader Belt and Road Initiative energy strategy.
“It reinforces the reality that infrastructure investment in fragile states is inseparable from political risk,” Aina added.
David Shinn, a professor at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs, said the pipeline reached a capacity of 110,000 barrels per day in 2025, making it a vital income source for the junta. However, “The [MPLJ] sees disruption of the pipeline as the best way to topple the junta and return Mohamed Bazoum to power,” Shinn said.
He said that because CNPC and its subsidiary, the West African Oil Pipeline Company, built and manage the pipeline, “this puts Chinese interests in the direct line of fire”.
China had provided the military government with a US$400 million oil-backed loan to address a cash shortage. While the country depended on crude shipments to service this debt, recent attacks and disputes had complicated repayment.
Shinn said when CNPC recently faced a similar situation in Sudan and South Sudan, it decided to pull out of the project, but this was after a significant number of years of profitable operation.

Withdrawing from Niger would result in significant financial losses, Shinn said. “Beijing might decide the situation is more manageable and take steps to protect the pipeline,” he added. “This would have direct implications for its non-interference policy.”
According to Christian-Geraud Neema, a Congolese mining and policy analyst and non-resident scholar with the Carnegie Africa Programme, CNPC cannot afford either a withdrawal or a sudden break with the current government, having made massive investments in the pipeline and controlling 100 per cent of Niger’s oil production.
“Lacking security or political tools comparable to those available to certain Western powers, China is discovering the limitations of its strategy based on massive investment and non-interference,” Neema wrote in The China-Global South Project in early February.
He said the situation in Niger served as a reminder that, in fragile states governed by regimes struggling to survive, even the most powerful Chinese actors remain susceptible to political manipulation.
However, Aina said, China’s doctrine of “non-interference” had always been pragmatic rather than absolute. In high-risk theatres such as the Sahel, economic exposure often drove a gradual security recalibration.
Aina said Beijing was unlikely to pursue overt military intervention. Instead, he suggested possible calibrated measures, such as improved private security arrangements, intelligence cooperation, capacity-building support to Niger’s security forces and “quiet diplomatic engagement with regional actors”.
“When strategic assets are threatened, economic non-interference becomes difficult to sustain in pure form. What we are witnessing is not a departure from policy, but an adaptation, where economic security concerns increasingly shape China’s external posture in conflict-affected states,” Aina added.


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Chinese nationals warned to avoid high-risk areas after infrastructure becomes a primary target for rebels seeking to halt military junta


Chinese nationals warned to avoid high-risk areas after infrastructure becomes a primary target for rebels seeking to halt military junta.


Why Beijing’s US$4.5 billion Niger-Benin oil pipeline is being attacked by rebels

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Chinese nationals warned to avoid high-risk areas after infrastructure becomes a primary target for rebels seeking to halt military junta

Chinese nationals warned to avoid high-risk areas after infrastructure becomes a primary target for rebels seeking to halt military junta