Category: Diplomacy

In 2021, Sino-Congolese relations were somewhat shaken when two major Chinese investments in the mining sector in D.R. Congo were questioned and investigated by NGOs and Congolese authorities. The Sicomines project was the target for some of this criticism. The ...

The United States government on Wednesday imposed new sanctions against Iranian oil companies and the network of firms that help facilitate the flow of Iranian crude to markets in East Asia, specifically China. Every year, millions of barrels of oil are effectively ...

The Algerian military is reportedly in talks with China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC) to purchase four of the company's WJ-700 Falcon armed reconnaissance drones, according to Algerian press reports. Algiers hopes the drones will help improve the air power balance ...

Kenya’s National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) released grim new data this week that highlights the acute problems confronting developing countries with large Chinese trade deficits and debts, both of which increased substantially: TRADE: The country’s trade deficit with China surged ...

The imminent handover of the newly-built Zimbabwe parliament building that was almost entirely paid for by the Chinese government has prompted a lively debate online about China's so-called "Palace Diplomacy" in Africa. Opinions about the new hall in Harare were largely split between ...

When President Xi Jinping announced China's Global Development Initiative (GDI) in September, the response among Western observers was muted.   Not so in China, where scholars see the GDI and its sibling, the Global Security Initiative, as the new step in China's global influence. ...

Big things are happening in the world, but don’t expect me to tell you what they are.  Like many South Africans, I’ve been a little distracted these days. The country’s notorious electricity situation has worsened to blackouts three times a ...

The past 4-5 days have been especially busy for Chinese diplomacy in Africa and Asia. This outreach included the first time that President Xi Jinping left Beijing since the pandemic began almost 900 days ago. Although technically still within China, President Xi's visit to Hong ...

A consortium of Chinese entrepreneurs based in Angola recently signed an agreement to build an electric power generation facility in the small Congolese city of Kenge, 269 kilometers west of the capital Kinshasa, according to Radio Okapi. Not much is known about ...

An unusual phenomenon occurred in Kenya over the past few days: the country's normally competitive newspapers all ran the same column written by China's envoy to Nairobi, Zhou Pingjian. Normally, newspapers insist on exclusivity when publishing columns like this. While we have no proof, it's possible that the ...

By Hugo Jones and Lukas Fiala At this year’s G7 summit, a new acronym joined the ranks of competing development finance initiatives. Forget the B3W – the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment (PGII) is the G7’s latest “joint offer to narrow ...

Iran is the second country this week, after Argentina, to submit an application to join the BRICS club. The BRICS group is increasingly seen by both Beijing and Moscow as a potential alternative to the Western-led international economic order. Although the BRICS states have agreed to expand their ...