Mnangagwa now in Beijing for China-Africa summit

By Agencies

BEIJING: President Emmerson Mnangagwa arrived in Beijing on Monday to attend the 2024 Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC), which will be held in the Chinese capital from September 4 to 6.

The Zimbabwean leader’s plane landed at the Beijing Capital International Airport at 15:45 local time.

China and Zimbabwe enjoy profound traditional friendship and political mutual trust, and China has strongly supported the Zimbabwean people in their struggle for national liberation.

Zimbabwe established diplomatic relationship with China on the very day of its independence, and the two countries will mark the 45th anniversary of the relationship in 2025.

The two countries have seen frequent high-level visits to each other. In April 2018, China became the first non-African country that Mnangagwa visited after he took office as the president, and during his visit, China-Zimbabwe relations were elevated to a comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership. In September of the same year, he went to China again to attend the 2018 FOCAC Beijing summit.

China is Zimbabwe’s largest source of investment and its third largest trading partner, and large lithium mines and steel plants invested by Chinese enterprises in Zimbabwe have been put into operation in succession.

The renovation and expansion project of Robert Gabriel Mugabe International Airport, with financing support from China, is nearing completion. China’s “small but beautiful” projects like the Juncao technology assistance are in full blossom in Zimbabwe.

The upcoming FOCAC summit will be held with the theme “Joining Hands to Advance Modernization and Build a High-Level China-Africa Community with a Shared Future.”

Many African leaders, including Moussa Faki Mahamat, chairman of the African Union Commission, will lead delegations to the summit. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres will attend as a special guest, and relevant international and regional organizations will participate as observers.

President Xi Jinping will deliver a keynote speech at the summit’s opening ceremony on September 5.

Following the 2006 FOCAC Beijing Summit, the 2015 FOCAC Johannesburg Summit, and the 2018 FOCAC Beijing Summit, the upcoming summit will be another happy reunion for the friendly family of China and Africa. It will also be the largest diplomatic event hosted by China in recent years.