Several West African presidents are in the Senegalese capital Dakar for two regional summits to be opened this week.

The summit of the West African Economic and Monetary Union (UEMOA) was scheduled to open on Thursday and that of the regional bloc ECOWAS on Friday.

The presidents who arrived here Wednesday include Blaise Compaore of Burkina Faso, Ibrahim Boubacar Keita of Mali, Mamadou Issoufou of Niger, Boni Yayi of Benin and Faure Gnassingbe of Togo.

The presidents of Guinea Bissau, Cote d'Ivoire and Senegal are also expected at the summits.

The 17th ordinary session of the UEMOA presidents will mainly discuss the economic situation in the CFA Zone which comprises eight member states.

After the summit, the UEMOA presidents will take part in the extraordinary summit of the 15-member Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).

The ECOWAS meeting will focus on the issue of regional integration and the Economic Partnership Agreements (EPAs) with the European Union (EU).

The meeting will also discuss the memorandum of the ECOWAS Commission president on the regional market and the report of the last extraordinary session of the council of ministers.

ECOWAS is the grouping of Benin, Burkina Faso, Cape Verde, Cote d'Ivoire, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea Bissau, Liberia, Mali, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.