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 ...
Country: African Union
A Call for the African Union to Break the Global South Debt Impasse
Gyude Moore, a senior policy fellow at the Center for Global Development, is among a small group of Washington, D.C.-based analysts trying to devise practical solutions for how developing countries can unblock the current impasse preventing debt-distressed countries from restructuring their loans.
“We’re Not Competing With China” in Africa Says Linda Thomas-Greenfield
The United States’s people-to-people ties in Africa make it impervious to Chinese competition, said U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, in an interview with CNN. It's interesting to compare it with remarks by her ...
Debunking Propaganda in the Debate Over “Western Private Creditor” Debt in Africa
In this short piece, I will use statistical data extracted from the World Bank's online database. The figures I will use here are for Africa as a whole, i.e. sub-Saharan Africa (the one most often referred to when talking about "African" debt) and North Africa. Figures are for the ...
Qin Gang Kicks Off African Tour with AU Commission Strategic Dialogue
"Africa should be a big stage for the international cooperation, not an arena for major countries competition." This was the message from Chinese Foreign Minister Qin Gang, speaking during a press conference with AU Commission head Moussa Faki Mahamat in Addis Ababa on Wednesday. ...
Symbolism Galore as Qin Gang Opens Africa CDC HQ
Qin Gang’s many photo-ops in Addis Ababa included the opening ceremony of the Chinese-built Africa Centers for Disease Control Headquarters building on Wednesday. This is the latest in a series of high-profile buildings for African multilateral and government bodies built by China, ...
Analysis from Cobus van Staden
Xi Bets on Global South in Moscow
China’s New FM Greeted as Old Friend in Ethiopia on First Stop of Africa Tour
Qin Gang landed in Addis Ababa early Tuesday morning to kick off his first tour of Africa as China's new Foreign Minister. Qin spent the morning with his Ethiopian counterpart Demeke Mekonnen at the foreign ministry, where the two later hosted a joint ...
Qin Gang Should Hit the Reset Button on Africa-China Relations: Expert
Qin Gang is taking over as Foreign Minister at an inflection point in Africa-China relations. While Chinese investment transformed African skylines, the relationship has also hit some problems. These include sky-high debt for projects that didn’t necessarily deliver hoped-for development outcomes. ...
U.S.-Africa Summit Strengthened Relationship but Didn’t Revolutionize It
As the U.S.-Africa Leaders’ Summit wraps up today, one is struck by a paradox: while several notable new deals were announced, the summit as a whole has been slightly underwhelming. The United States seemed determined to combat two interrelated narratives. First, ...
Chinese State Media Strident on Summit
While the Chinese public seems disinterested in the U.S.-Africa Leaders’ Summit, China’s state media is rolling out the invective. The state-owned nationalist tabloid Global Times published two highly negative articles dismissing the summit. In ...
African Media Largely Indifferent to Summit
The U.S.-Africa Leaders’ Summit has drawn very little media attention in Africa. The coverage that appeared was rehashed copy from international news agencies. Very few publications focused on how the outcomes will affect their home countries. This lack of domestic framing ...