After a nine-year break, the U.S.-Africa International Summit will hold in Washington from December 13 to 15, 2022.
The summit aims to reiterate “the importance of the U.S.-Africa relationship and increased cooperation on shared global priorities,” according to a White House statement.
It will be a forum for bilateral and multilateral talks between the United States and African countries.
The last such meeting was held was in 2014, during the President Barack Obama administration (2008-2016).
When he came to power in 2016, Republican Donald Trump had shown little or no interest in the African continent.
It took the arrival of another Democrat in power, Joe Biden, to resurrect this summit, which will host 49 African governments.
The goal is to discuss “the world’s most pressing challenges, from pandemics and climate change to the negative consequences of the invasion of Ukraine, to the issues that concern us all, namely democracy and governance, security, trade, investment and development,” said Judd Devermont, senior director of African Affairs.
The first day will be devoted to young leaders from the African Diaspora.
It will be followed by a civil society forum and a conversation on the African Growth and Opportunity Act.
The U.S. diplomat also announced in an online press conference that a session on peace, governance and security will be co-chaired this Tuesday, December 13, by Secretary of State Antony Blinken, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Administrator Samantha Power.
“Of course, we will also have sessions on health cooperation, health security, conversation support, climate adaptation and energy transition,” added Judd Devermont, mentioning a session on “U.S.-Africa space cooperation.”
The second day opens with a business forum.
“This is the third business forum since 2014, focusing on issues that really matter to our African partners and the U.S. private sector in the areas of trade, finance, energy, infrastructure, agribusiness and digital,” Devermont said.
“It will also include an opening luncheon by Secretary Blinken and opportunities for U.S. and African companies to network and announce deals and really deepen this important trade and investment relationship,” he added.
Highly anticipated, the final day coinciding with Thursday, December 15, will be the leaders’ day.
“It will begin with a speech by President Biden and we will have a discussion about what Africans want and the relationship we need to have going forward,” he said.
According to the U.S. diplomat, Mali, Guinea, Burkina Faso, Sudan and Eritrea have not been invited to the summit.
Four of these five countries have witnessed military coups in the recent past.
In the case of Eritrea, the United States cited the absence of diplomatic relations as the cause for leaving out Asmara.
AC/cgd/fss/as/APA