The leaders also resolved to curb terrorism and other forms of insecurity threatening the region.
ECOWAS has called for increased investment in security to address states of emergency across West Africa amid rising military threats and political instability.
The commission’s president warned that terrorists were increasingly waging “economic warfare” by disrupting fuel supplies and trade routes.
Around four million people are now displaced across Burkina Faso, Mali, Niger, and neighbouring countries.
President of the ECOWAS Commission, Omar Touray, made the appeal on Thursday in Abuja at the West African Islamic Conference on Security and Governance.
Mr Touray urged the AU and the UN to support regional counter-terrorism operations.
Mr Gambari called on African nations to first secure their own nations before securing the region and continent at large.
Mr Touray said the ministers also approved the bloc’s trade and investment promotion strategy
About 54 soldiers were killed in the terrorist attack in northern Benin on April 17.
Omar Touray has called on Turkey to step up its support to ECOWAS’s efforts toward curbing terrorism in West Africa.
