BEIJING: China\u2019s top diplomat began his annual New Year tour of Africa on Sunday, maintaining a 35-year-long tradition, to quietly advance Beijing\u2019s already sizeable influence across the resource-rich continent as Europe\u2019s presence wanes and America\u2019s wavers.
\nWhile global capitals and investors brace for the return of US President-elect Donald Trump to the White House, and wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and domestic politics keep German and French ministers occupied, Foreign Minister Wang Yi being in Namibia, the Republic of Congo, Chad and Nigeria highlights the consistency of China\u2019s engagement with Africa, analysts say.
\nWang\u2019s visit through to Saturday also comes as the world\u2019s No. 2 economy ramps up its financial support for the debt-laden continent and looks to strike more critical minerals deals and find markets to absorb its exports.
\n\u201cThe decision on which countries to go to each year rarely follows any external logic,\u201d said Eric Orlander, co-founder of the China-Global South Project. \u201cBut it resonates in Africa as a reminder of China\u2019s consistent commitment to the continent, in contrast to the approaches of the US, UK and EU.\u201d
\n\u201cChina firmly believes that Africa has never been a forgotten continent, but rather a source of vitality and a land full of development potential,\u201d Guo Jiakun, a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson, told a regular news conference on Monday.<\/p>\n
As China\u2019s economy slows, Africa offers a much-needed avenue for its state-owned infrastructure firms struggling for projects as indebted local governments hold off on spending, and a market for its electric vehicles and solar panels, areas where the US and EU say it has over-capacity.
\nAfrica\u2019s 50-plus votes at the UN could also help advance Beijing\u2019s efforts to reshape multilateral institutions and reinterpret global norms so that they are more in line with its interests, particularly on issues such as human rights.
\nWhile current US President Joe Biden\u2019s December trip to Angola was his only visit to sub-Saharan Africa in his presidency, China puts Africa at the front of its diplomatic calendar.
\n\u201cChina has become central to Africa\u2019s policy, as an actor and an inspiration,\u201d said Hannah Ryder, founder of Development Reimagined, an African-owned consultancy, referring to how candidates vying to chair the African Union Commission have talked up Beijing\u2019s ability to improve Africa\u2019s manufacturing capabilities and China\u2019s track record in mass education ahead of February\u2019s election. The commission is the secretariat of the 55-nation African Union.
\nWang\u2019s decision to visit the Republic of Congo, which this year takes over as co-chair of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation that sets the agenda for China-Africa relations, also points to China\u2019s commitment to implementing the outcomes of last year\u2019s summit, Ryder said, where China pledged $51 billion in fresh financial assistance.
\nBeijing is also beginning to make its presence felt on pressing regional security issues, analysts say, which partly explains why Wang will travel to Chad.
\nFrance last month began the withdrawal of its military from the Central African country, after its government unexpectedly ended a defense cooperation pact that had made it a key Western ally in the fight against militants in the region.
\n\u201cChina has been a reliable and stable partner for the new military juntas in the Sahel and West Africa,\u201d Orland said.
\n\u201cFor the French and US, who see a dilution of Western power in the region, China\u2019s presence is seen as \u2018controversial,\u2019 but it\u2019s a very different view from African perspectives.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BEIJING: China\u2019s top diplomat began his annual New Year tour of Africa on Sunday, maintaining a 35-year-long tradition, to quietly advance Beijing\u2019s already sizeable influence across the resource-rich continent as Europe\u2019s presence wanes and America\u2019s wavers. While global capitals and investors brace for the return of US President-elect Donald Trump to the White House, and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":75292,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75279"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75279\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75295,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75279\/revisions\/75295"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75292"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}