Author: Eric Olander
Eric Olander is the co-founder of the China Global South Project, an independent, non-partisan media initiative dedicated to exploring every facet of China’s engagement in Africa. Eric is a fluent Mandarin-speaker and a longtime China-watcher with more than 25 years of journalism experience at many of the world’s leading media companies, including CNN, the BBC, and FRANCE24, among others. He received his undergraduate degree in East African History from the University of California at Berkeley and holds a master’s degree in Chinese Public Affairs from the University of Hong Kong.
Related Posts
The World Bank Has a Cool New Interactive Tool Showing How Much DSSI-Eligible Countries Pay to Service Their Debts
The World Bank released a new interactive database that details how much each of the DSSI-eligible countries will pay in 2020 and 2021 to service their bilateral debts. As the world's preeminent bilateral creditor, it's not surprising that the largest boxes on the graph represent China's outsized ...
With or Without Debt Relief, Most Chinese Contractors in Africa Still Benefit
China has come under intense criticism from stakeholders in Africa, the U.S. and Europe for its refusal to enact an across-the-board debt relief plan for African borrowers. Instead, Beijing has opted to negotiate bilaterally and reach debt settlement agreements separately. Marketwatch ...
How China Uses “Soft Law” To Engage Countries in Its Belt and Road Initiative
Since a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) or a so-called "cooperation agreement" is not legally binding, many U.S. and European stakeholders often shrug when China announces that it's signed one of these agreements with countries along its Belt and Road Initiative. That's ...
The Head of One of China’s Major Foreign Policy Think Tanks Proposes 4 Ways to Revive Slumping China-Africa Trade
Two-way China-Africa trade dropped by almost 20% to just $82 billion in the first half of the year due to lockdowns brought on by the COVID-19 outbreak. With China's economy recovering well, it's possible that some of those losses will be made up in Q3 ...
In One of His First Public Appearances as China’s New Ambassador to South Africa, Chen Xiaodong Reaffirms Beijing’s Commitment to African Infrastructure Development
China's newly-arrived envoy to South Africa, Chen Xiaodong, made one of his first public appearances on Tuesday in a webinar organized by the South African Institute of International Affairs. Speaking from the embassy in Pretoria, Ambassador Chen spoke for about thirty minutes at the beginning of the ...
Who Exactly is the Chinese Embassy in Liberia Trying to Reach by Publishing a Tweet in Chinese With a WeChat Link?
China's ambassador to Liberia, Ren Yisheng, made a pro forma visit this week to meet the new foreign minister, Dee-Maxwell Saah Kemayah and, as is now customary, the embassy published a Tweet about the meeting. But what's unusual is ...
China’s Foreign Ministry Rebuts Critics of its Debt Relief Strategy in Africa
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian pointedly rejected accusations that Beijing is not doing enough to help alleviate the worsening debt crisis in Africa. Speaking to reporters at the ministry's regular press briefing in Beijing on Monday, Zhao refuted the suggestion that China is ...
Ghana’s Finance Minister: “Africa Is Not Asking for Charity. It Is Asking for Equity.”
Ghana's Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta issued an urgent call for action on African debt relief in a column published in the Financial Times on Monday that also included stinging rebukes of the United States, China, and the financial services industry for their perceived failures.
It’s Been a Busy Month in Algiers With Visits From the U.S. Defense Chief Followed by Yang Jiechi, One of China’s Highest Ranking Officials
Yang Jiechi, one of China's top foreign policy officials and also a member of the politburo, spent last weekend in Algiers where he held talks with President Abdelmadjid Tebboune and Foreign Minister Sabri Boukadoum. Yang's visit comes just ...
Score Keeping: Which African Countries Aligned With China at the United Nations on Xinjiang and Hong Kong
African countries were once again pulled into a bitter dispute last week at the United Nations between China and a coalition largely made up by the U.S. Germany and other European countries over human rights conditions in Xinjiang. For the second ...
A New Chinese-Built Egyptian Capital is Rising Out of the Sand Near Cairo
Egypt's new administrative capital located 45 kilometers outside of the current capital in Cairo is now taking shape and with towers rising from the barren, sandy landscape. The project's being built and financed by the state-owned construction giant China State Construction Engineering Corporation (CSCEC).
China’s High-Risk, High-Reward C19 Vaccine Diplomacy in Africa
Last May, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced that Beijing would make any future COVID-19 vaccine available to Africa and other developing regions as a "global public good." He didn't explain, though, what that actually meant. Since that speech to the World ...