Today is a public holiday in South Africa – Human Rights Day. There’s a certain irony in spending the day focusing on China’s President Xi Jinping’s visit to Vladimir Putin, knee-deep in a human rights disaster.
What one makes of the Ukraine crisis increasingly maps on where one lives. This is made clear by a remarkable new set of polling data recently published by the European Council on Foreign Relations ...
Day: May 19, 2021
Ghana President Akufo-Addo Calls For the Cancellation of All African Debts
Ghanaian President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo issued an urgent call for immediate economic relief, including the total cancellation of all debts owed by African countries, during his address on Tuesday at the Summit on Financing African Economies. Without the ‘fiscal room to breathe,’ Africa could truly become ‘the forgotten continent, ...
Niger President Mohamed Bazoum Criticizes “Western Complaining” About Chinese and Turkish Investment in His Country
Niger's President Mohamed Bazoum criticized the media for creating the impression that the west African country is beset by security challenges and not a safe place to invest. He said in an interview with ...
The U.S. and China Trade Barbs Over Who’s More Righteous in Distributing COVID-19 Vaccines to Poor Countries in the Global South
United States President Joe Biden took aim at China on Tuesday in remarks about Washington's plan to begin sending tens of millions of COVID-19 vaccine doses to developing countries. The President implied that China's vaccine distribution to low-income countries is politically motivated and said that the U.S. ...
U.S. Senator Blasts China For Selling Countries “Garbage Vaccines” and Prompts a Furious Media Backlash From Beijing
While U.S. President Joe Biden and Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman Zhao Lijian took swipes at one another on Tuesday over global vaccine distribution, another dispute broke out -- this one between a prominent Republican Senator and the nationalist Chinese tabloid Global Times.
Linda Thomas-Greenfield is Worried About Africa’s Relationship With China
The U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield (photo), said the Biden administration's new policy for Africa will contrast sharply not only with Donald Trump's but also China's engagement on the continent. In an interview with the state-owned Voice of ...
Analysis from Cobus van Staden
Xi Bets on Global South in Moscow
Conservatives in the U.S. Say Biden’s Energy Policies Would Expose the U.S. to Become “Dependent Upon China and Its Client States in the Congo”
Apparently, the Democratic Republic of Congo is a "client state" of the Chinese government, or at least according to the latest meme to emerge on conservative U.S. media sites like Fox News. China's dominance in the DRC cobalt mining sector is prompting some to worry that a ...
Ghanaian MP Sparks Furore by Accusing Members of His Own Ruling Party of Protecting Chinese Illegal Miners
Outspoken Ghanaian Member of Parliament, Kennedy Agyapong, issued a stunning warning this weekend when he appeared on national television to accuse members of his own ruling New Patriotic Party (NPP) of supporting illegal mining operators known as galamsey, including some who are Chinese.
So, What Exactly Did Emmanuel Macron Accomplish With His African Finance Summit? Nothing Substantive.
The day-long Summit on the Financing of African Economies wrapped up in Paris on Tuesday and left a lot of people scratching their heads wondering what exactly was the purpose of the gathering. Unlike Monday's event that focused on Sudanese debt ...
Sierra Leone’s Fishing Minister: ‘There Must Be Development’
The deal between the government of Sierra Leone and Chinese entities to build an industrial fishing harbor on 100 hectares of beach and rainforest reads like a textbook example of why China remains so unpopular among many African communities, even as its relationship with African governments goes ...