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Critical Minerals Weekly: China’s Rare Earth Reset, Copper Overcapacity, and Zimbabwe’s Big Lithium Gamble

This is a free preview of the upcoming Critical Minerals Weekly Digest, part of the new CGSP Intelligence service launching in Summer 2025. After months of strategic restrictions, China has agreed to resume rare earth exports to the U.S. as ...

China, the U.S., and the Competition for Africa’s Strategic Resources

Southern Africa has become a focal point of geopolitical competition, with the U.S., China, and other global powers maneuvering for influence over key infrastructure projects and critical resources. The Lobito Corridor Project, a railway and logistics ...

Navigating U.S.-China Rivalry: Africa’s Strategic Response in the Trump Era

The U.S.-China relationship is at a critical inflection point as Donald Trump tries to reset ties with his counterpart Xi Jinping. The U.S. President has repeatedly said he wants to negotiate a comprehensive trade agreement that would, in his view, lead ...

USAID’s Closure Threatens to Derail U.S. Involvement in the Lobito Corridor

U.S. participation in the Lobito Corridor project that aims to challenge China's dominance of African critical resource supply chains is now in jeopardy due to the Trump administration's decision this month to shut down the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). ...

What does Trump 2.0 Offer to Africa?

As the world shifts into gear for the next Trump term, striking new polling results have revealed a split in opinion about the incoming president.  An opinion survey of developed and developing countries by the European Council on Foreign ...

Analysis from Cobus van Staden

BRICS Announces Numerous New Initiatives

The BRICS group wrapped up its two-day leaders’ summit in Rio de Janeiro on Monday. The summit’s final communique is a 16,000-word doorstop that covers numerous issues from economics to education.
The communique avoids any direct mention of the United States, and references to “unilateralism” and other coded criticism are also relatively scarce. Rather, the communique keeps the focus on the BRICS’ vision of the strengthening and reform of the global multilateral system ...

In Angola, Biden Promises to Invest Differently to China

President Joe Biden will make the case on Wednesday in Angola that the United States must do better rather than more than China to regain influence in Africa. Biden is on the second day of a visit to the African country, ...

Biden Announces $1 Billion for Africa During Maiden Trip

By Aurélia End U.S. President Joe Biden on Tuesday announced more than $1 billion in humanitarian assistance to Africa during a visit to Angola, where the United States is showcasing a major infrastructure project aimed at countering China's investments on the ...

China Will Be on Everyone’s Mind When Biden Visits Angola This Week

Joe Biden boarded Air Force One late Sunday night, bound for West Africa in what will likely be the outgoing U.S. president's final overseas trip before he leaves office next month. The President will travel to Angola with a brief stopover ...

With Angola Trip, Biden Fulfills His Promise to Visit Sub-Saharan Africa

By Aurélia End Outgoing U.S. President Joe Biden is headed to the southern African country of Angola this week, fulfilling a key promise in a bid to shore up ties with the continent. Biden, who ...

[WEEK IN REVIEW] China’s Role in Africa’s Energy Transition and Biden’s Angola Trip

The Sirexe “Salon International des Ressources Extractives et Energetiques”  conference took place this week in the Ivory Coast and brought together ministers, policymakers and corporate leaders from across the continent to discuss Africa's energy transition. ...

Angola’s Big Bet on Biden Now Risks Backfiring

Pity poor Angola. President João Lourenço placed a multimillion-dollar bet on hiring expensive Washington, D.C. lobbying firms to put his southern African country on the U.S. agenda. Whatever they did worked because, over the past several years, Angola seemingly became the ...

HOT TAKES: Early Predictions of How Trump’s Win Could Affect Key China-Global South Issues

AFRICA: The outcome of the U.S. election for Africa will likely be mixed. South Africa will likely face increased pressure from U.S. policymakers around its opposition to Israeli actions in Gaza, and perceptions of its closeness to Russia and China. Such pressure will likely push it ...
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