 A summit of the West African regional grouping ECOWAS has appointed the president of Senegal, Basiru Jomai Fai, to mediate between the bloc and the military leaders of three Sahel countries that pulled out of the bloc on Saturday. The ECOWAS commission president, Omar Toure, warned that the departure of Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger meant that the region risked political isolation and growing Islamist militancy.