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The News Feed is curated by CGSP’s editors in Asia and Africa.

Five Reasons Why Chinese Private Investment is Flowing Into Africa

Almost a decade, China passed the United States to become Africa’s leading source of foreign direct investment. LSE Senior Visiting Fellow Shirley Ze Yu explains why Chinese companies are looking to ...
by Eric Olander

The Central Chinese Province of Hunan is Now a Major Hub For China-Africa Engagement

When most people think about the major centers of Sino-Africa engagement, cities like Guangzhou and Beijing tend to come to mind first. How about Changsha? Well, not so much. But if you’re not ...
by Eric Olander

Chinese Professor Identifies Three Risks For China in Beijing’s Recent Iran Deal

The recent signing of a 25-year comprehensive strategic partnership agreement between China and Iran sparked considerable debate within China about whether the benefits of a deal with Tehran are worth the ...
by Eric Olander

China’s Recent Iran Deal Should be Seen in a Much Broader Context Urges One of China’s Most Prominent Mideast Scholars

There’s been a lot of discussion over the past week about the implications of the China-Iran comprehensive strategic partnership agreement the two sides signed during Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s recent visit to Tehran. ...
by Eric Olander

Beware of the Chinese Chicken Trope in Zambia

A fascinating on-air skirmish broke out on the FRANCE 24 talk show The Debate last week during a conversation over Chinese investment and influence in Zambia. One of the show’s guests, acclaimed China-Zambia ...
by Eric Olander

New CARI Report on Chinese Lending to Africa Doesn’t “Tell the Whole Story” Says Well-Known Chinese Analyst

The China-Africa Research Initiative’s (CARI) latest report on the downturn in Chinese overseas lending to African governments that was published earlier this week was not well-received in some quarters of Beijing. ...
by Eric Olander

China Donates a Fleet of SUVs to Uganda For an International Conference That Never Happened

China’s ambassador to Uganda, Zheng Zhuqiang, handed over 70 brand new SUVs to Uganda’s Foreign Affairs Minister Sam Kutesa at a ceremony in Kampala on Wednesday. The vehicles were supposed to have been ...
by Eric Olander

China Tries to Calm U.S. Anxieties About New Pact With Iran

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif (R) and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, pose for a picture after signing an agreement in the capital Tehran, on March 27, 2021. AFP
One of China’s most prominent Iran scholars, Fan Hongda from the Shanghai Institute of International Relations, published a column in the Communist Party-controlled English-language newspaper China Daily that appears intended to ...
by Eric Olander

New Report on Chinese Loans Challenges China’s “Win-Win” Narrative

The release of Wednesday’s groundbreaking report that analyzed 100 Chinese state-backed loans to developing countries over a three-year period sparked considerable international media coverage.  While the 77-page report produced by researchers at ...
by Eric Olander

A Groundbreaking New Report Provides Unprecedented Insights Into Chinese Lending Practices Around the World

A new report provides an unprecedented view into Chinese loan contracts with dozens of governments throughout the Global South. Researchers from AidData, the Kiel Institute, and the Center for Global Development analyzed 100 ...
by Eric Olander

Michael Pettis: China’s Dramatic Curtailment in Overseas Lending Shows That Beijing is Learning the Same Lesson Today That Other Creditors Learned Years Ago

Acclaimed China economist, Peking University professor, and Carnegie Senior Fellow Michael Pettis posted a 7-part Twitter thread on Tuesday where he reflected on the new data published by the ...
by Eric Olander

Nigerian Minister Blames “Selfish Lawmakers” for Jeopardizing Chinese Railway Loans

File photo of Nigerian Transportation Minister Rotimi Amaechi. PIUS UTOMI EKPEI / AFP
Nigeria’s outspoken Transportation Minister Rotimi Amaechi accused lawmakers in the House of Representatives of being “selfish” for launching a probe into a 2018 Chinese loan agreement. Representatives erroneously thought that the waiver of ...
by Eric Olander

Africa Benefitting From China’s Determination to Move Away From Australian Commodity Suppliers

File image of an Australian iron ore mine. Australia's mining exports may become the next targets in the country's worsening trade dispute with China. AMY COOPES / AFP FILES / AFP
China appears willing to pay higher financial and environmental costs if it means ending its dependence on Australian commodities including iron ore and coal. China has been steadily diversifying its sourcing of key ...
by Eric Olander

Analysis from Cobus van Staden

Revealing Reactions to China’s Festival of Optics

In terms of geopolitical optics, this week was nothing short of a banquet. It served up at least two sets of images that seem to crystallize our historical moment and that will live on in the Wikipedia of history as shorthand for where the world was in 2025.
One is the waves of uncannily synchronized soldiers and a bewildering array of high-tech weaponry gliding down Beijing’s Chang’an Avenue. The ...

Everyone’s Still Trying to Figure Out If The New China-Iran Agreement is a Big Deal or a Whole Lot of Nothing

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif (R) and his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi, pose for a picture after signing an agreement in the capital Tehran, on March 27, 2021. AFP
Conservative commentators and media in the United States all seem to think that China’s newly signed 25-year strategic cooperation agreement with Iran is a game-changer and marks the emergence of a new anti-democratic power ...
by Eric Olander

Who China Lends Money to in Africa and How Much They Provide Has Changed a Lot

One of the key findings in CARI’s newest report on Chinese lending patterns in Africa revealed a major shift in who Chinese creditors are lending money to and for how much. The once ...
by Eric Olander

UN Secretary-General Issues Stark Warning on Developing World Debt: Too Little’s Been Done and Now It’s Too Late

United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres issued a dark warning on Monday that too little had been done to resolve the burgeoning debt crisis in developing countries what has been so far is “too limited ...
by Eric Olander

A Proposed Senate Bill Intended to Increase U.S. Exports to Africa Seems to be Far More Focused on Confronting China

U.S. Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin published a press release on Monday that touted a new bipartisan bill that aims to increase U.S. exports to Africa. The “Increasing American Jobs through ...
by Eric Olander

Human Rights Watch’s Africa Advocacy Director Can’t Understand Why African Leaders Are “Shielding China Over Xinjiang”

Photo from a recent conference in Beijing where ambassadors from Burkina Faso, the Republic of Congo, and Sudan all enthusiastically endorsed China's policies in Xinjiang. Image via @WuPeng_MFAChina.
Human Rights Watch Africa Advocacy Director Carine Kaneza Nantulya is puzzled as to why African governments are not doing anything to confront China on the mass internment of Uyghur minorities in Xinjiang. 
by Eric Olander

Chinese Vaccine Shipments to Africa Pick Up As Beijing Reports 260 Million Doses Delivered Worldwide

Chinese vaccine deliveries to Africa appear to have picked up pace with shipments going to more countries over the past week, according to the latest tracking map produced by CGTN.
by Eric Olander

UAE to Become First Country Outside of China to Manufacture Sinopharm COVID-19 Vaccines

China's foreign minister Wang Yi and his UAE counterpart Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan hold up doses of the Chinese-made Sinopharm vaccine, in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, March 28 2021. Image via Emirates News Agency.
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi closed out his Persian Gulf tour on Sunday with a major announcement that the United Arab Emirates would become the first country outside of China to manufacture the ...
by Eric Olander

Key Highlights From Wang Yi’s Six-Nation Tour of the Persian Gulf and Turkey

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi returned home on Sunday after wrapping up a five-day, six-nation tour of the Persian Gulf and Turkey. Wang’s visit highlighted the growing importance that Beijing now assigns to ...
by Eric Olander

Human Rights, Non-Interference and Trade at the Top of Wang Yi’s Agenda in Saudi Arabia

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi kicked off a week-long six-nation tour of the Persian Gulf and Turkey on Wednesday with a stop in Riyadh, where he met with his Saudi Arabian counterpart Prince Faisal ...
by Eric Olander

China Extends Pandemic Relief to Another Multilateral Organization

Liu Yuxi, China's ambassador to the African Union, and Vera Songwe, Executive Secretary of United Nations Economic Commission for Africa attend a handover ceremony for medical supplies donated to UNECA, in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on March 24, 2021. Image via Xinhua.
China donated a batch of medical supplies (not vaccines though) to the United Nations Economic Commission in Africa in what now appears to be part of a larger effort to provide ...
by Eric Olander

Why Is China is Sending Vaccines to Certain Countries and Not Others?

Handover ceremony of Chinese vaccines at the Maya-Maya International Airport in Brazzaville.
The list of countries receiving Chinese vaccines around the world is large and growing but it’s still not clear what criteria China uses to distribute vaccines to some countries over others. Two Czech ...
by Eric Olander

In 5 Years, the Battle Over Cobalt is Going to Intensify… a LOT!

There are just five years left before the demand for cobalt, a critical metal used to make the batteries in electric vehicles, is going to outstrip the known supply of this strategically vital ...
by Eric Olander

Someone is Notably Absent From This Year’s Alibaba-Backed Africa’s Business Heroes Awards

Organizers of the annual Africa’s Business Heroes prize sent out an announcement on Wednesday that the online portal to apply for the competition will open on Monday.  In the past, just last year ...
by Eric Olander

Council on Foreign Relations Report: U.S. “Inaction” and “Withdrawal” Bolstered China’s BRI

GREG BAKER / AFP
A group of scholars at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York published a critical report today that attributes U.S. “inaction” and “withdrawal” for creating a vacuum in the international ...
by Eric Olander

Momentum is Building For the IMF to Issue $650 Billion in New Capital Intended to Help Developing Countries

File image of the International Monetary Fund headquarters in Washington, D.C. SAUL LOEB / AFP
The International Monetary Fund may issue new Special Drawing Rights (SDR) that would provide $650 billion to its members, the bulk of which is intended to go to the world’s poorest countries to ...
by Eric Olander
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Developing Countries’ Debt Servicing Costs to China Are Significant, but Nowhere Near as Much as Other Creditors
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