Secretary of State Antony Blinken became the latest senior US official to visit Africa as part of a broader push by Washington to re-engage with the continent’s leaders at a time when the region is facing stark security challenges and economic fallout from the war in Ukraine.
(Bloomberg) — Secretary of State Antony Blinken became the latest senior US official to visit Africa as part of a broader push by Washington to re-engage with the continent’s leaders at a time when the region is facing stark security challenges and economic fallout from the war in Ukraine.
Blinken met Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed for about two-and-a-half hours in Addis Ababa on Wednesday to discuss a peace deal struck late last year to end a two-year civil war that saw atrocities committed on both sides, and announced $331 million in new humanitarian assistance for the country.
He also met with parties to the cease-fire, which US officials are hopeful could end a violent chapter in Africa’s second-most populous country and lead to closer economic ties with the US.
“It is a very important moment, a moment of hope,” Blinken told his Ethiopian counterpart, Foreign Minister Demeke Mekonnen, at a morning meeting, referring to the peace deal with Tigrayan rebels in the north part of the country. “There is a lot to be done,” he said. “Probably the most important thing is to deepen the peace that has taken hold in the north.”
His comments featured plenty of praise for Abiy’s government and were broadly hopeful, reflecting a willingness on the US to move past the brutal conflict that strained ties between the two countries, particularly as Ethiopia struggles with a drought and higher food prices.
The visit comes amid a flurry of trips by US delegations to Africa amid concerns about the influence of China and Russian Wagner Group mercenaries on the continent. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, US Ambassador to the United Nations Linda Thomas-Greenfield and First Lady Jill Biden all recently made multi-nation visits after President Joe Biden hosted African leaders for a summit in December, and Vice President Kamala Harris is set to visit Africa later this month.
In a sign of the contest for influence on the continent, China’s special envoy for the Horn of Africa also appeared to be in Addis Ababa on Wednesday, meeting with an Ethiopian foreign ministry official who tweeted that he requested Chinese assistance for post-conflict reconstruction and rehabilitation efforts. The Ethiopian capital is dotted with Chinese infrastructure, including prominent buildings and a new highway.
Blinken’s delegation were in the Ethiopian capital to discuss humanitarian issues and Ethiopia’s drought crisis. They will also talk about economic relations following the US decision to suspend its duty-free access under the African Growth and Opportunity Act over allegations that Ethiopian government forces committed “gross violations” of human rights during the conflict. The US has provided more than $3 billion in assistance to Ethiopia since 2020.
In a press briefing Wednesday, Blinken struck a conciliatory tone with the Ethiopian government, stressing that Ethiopia’s suspension was “required by law” and that “all parties” committed atrocities in the civil war. He said the US was hopeful that Ethiopia could soon regain duty-free access to the US market under the AGOA agreement, as the government continues to make progress implementing the cessation of hostilities agreement with Tigray.
“Ethiopia has clear benchmarks for a pathway for reinstatement — the administration will continue to work closely with the government to achieve that objective, which we share,” he said, adding that fully implementing the peace deal was “extremely important to moving down that path, and my hope and expectation is that will continue.”
In his meeting with the Ethiopian prime minister earlier in the day, Blinken praised the government for “silencing the guns in northern Ethiopia” and allowing humanitarian access to the region, but also stressed to Abiy “the importance of accountability for the atrocities” committed during the war, State Department spokesman Ned Price said in a statement. Blinken also expressed concern about a fresh conflict in Ethiopia’s Oromia region, where hundreds have died in fighting between rebels and security forces, Price added.
The top US diplomat is set to meet with African Union Commission Chairman Moussa Faki Mahamat on Thursday morning. The two will discuss how the US and the continental body “can cooperate in strengthening the capability of African countries to resist and overcome the negative consequences of Wagner’s activity,” Phee said.
The sanctioned Russian mercenary group is “compromising African sovereignty, worsening insecurity, harming civilians, and exploiting African mineral wealth,” even amid the broader fallout across Africa of higher commodity and fertilizer prices as a result of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, she said.
On Thursday, Blinken will fly to Niger, where he’ll become the first secretary of state to visit the landlocked West African nation. He’ll hold discussions on regional security in the Sahel region, where Islamist militants have waged an insurgency for almost a decade that’s killed thousands of people and displaced millions more.
Terrorist attacks have more than doubled in sub-Saharan Africa since 2016, even as worldwide deaths from terrorism have declined, the UN Development Program said in a January report. Roughly half of all terrorism-related deaths were in sub-Saharan Africa, with just four countries — Niger, Somalia, Burkina Faso and Mali — accounting for more than one-third of the fatalities, it said.
(Updates throughout.)
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