Chinese President Visits Senegal
Chinese President, Hu Jintao, begins an official visit in Senegal today, where he will meet with the Senegalese President, Mr. Abdoulaye Wade. It is expected the visit will emphasize on co-operations and aid while the international attention is focused on Chinese hunt for commodities.
This visit to Senegal is part of Mr Hu’s African tour, which includes Tanzania, Mauritius. Earlier Hu was in Mali where he met his counterpart President Amadou Toumani Touré. The tour is part of Chinese effort to strengthen its relations with the continent, an important source of minerals and other raw materials for China and a growing market for Chinese exports.
Beijing has stressed that the trip will focus more on shoring up political ties and boosting aid to African countries, working with them to fight the impact of the global economic crisis and less on securing energy supplies.
China is often criticized for its alleged drive to secure natural resources from African states, including from regimes spurned by the West like Sudan, and its “no-strings-attached” attitude towards aid.
Hu’ visit to Africa follows after a three-day visit to Saudi Arabia where he left with a contract to build a monorail system in Islam’s holiest city, and a pact on oil and petrochemicals supplies under his arm.
At a summit in Beijing in 2006 China pledged to double aid to Africa in three years. Ahead of this visit Beijing said that it is ready to work more closely with African countries in the light of the global economic crisis which is expected to affect the continent by a drop in foreign investments, development aid and remittances from workers abroad.
In the past few years China has ramped up its cooperation and aid efforts in Senegal spending on large infrastructure projects, health care and education.
Dakar and Beijing re-established diplomatic ties in 2005, after a 10-year hiatus over Senegal’s prior recognition of Taiwan.
The world’s biggest steel maker Arcelor Mittal estimates that its Senegalese mine, which is due to open in 2011, can produce 25 million tonnes of iron ore annually. However there are concerns that the global downturn will affect output.
Dakar has also intensified its search for oil in the southern Casamance region where there are estimated oil reserves of one billion barrels currently too expensive to exploit because of technical difficulties.
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