China pledged wider market access, billions in new financing and a more active role in Africa’s security on Thursday in its drive to deepen ties with the continent and push back at containment by the West.
Addressing more than 50 African leaders at the FOCAC Summit in Beijing, Chinese President Xi Jinping promised to unilaterally exempt 33 of Africa’s less-developed countries from import tariffs, and committed 360 billion yuan (US$50.6 billion) in new financing over the next three years to “help turn China’s big market into Africa’s big opportunity”.
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Besides bankrolling the building of green energy, “small but beautiful” livelihood-improving and big connectivity projects, Xi also pledged to deepen military and economic cooperation by training thousands of military personnel, providing food relief and sharing its governance experience with Africa.
The pledges dovetailed with Beijing’s efforts to position itself as the leader of the world’s developing countries – also known as the Global South – by appealing to a common pursuit of modernisation and opposition to a West-led order
“Modernisation is an inalienable right of all countries, but the Western approach to it has inflicted immense sufferings on developing countries … We should jointly advance modernisation that is just and equitable,” Xi told the attendees at the ninth Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Summit.
“We always empathise with and support each other, setting a stellar example of a new type of international relations.”