Multilateral Synergy

Chinese and African leaders reinforce anti-pandemic cooperation

- Hu Fan

One of the positive spinoffs of the COVID-19 pandemic is the enhanced awareness of the need for solidarity it has created worldwide. This was very much in evidence on June 17, when Chinese and African leaders got together for the Extraordinary China-Africa Summit on Solidarity Against COVID-19.

The summit, held via video link, was jointly proposed by China, South Africa, the rotating chair of the African Union (AU), and Senegal, the co-chair of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC).

The aim of the summit was to explore opportunities for African states to leverage multilateral cooperation through the FOCAC mechanism so that resources and knowledge can be mobilized to combat the pandemic.

Chinese President Xi Jinping chaired the summit from Beijing, calling for more efforts to mobilize necessary resources, improve collaboration, and minimize the fallout of COVID-19 in his keynote speech.

Leaders of African countries, including members of the AU Assembly of Heads of State and Government and rotating chairs of major African sub-regional organizations, and the chairperson of the AU Commission, attended the summit.

UN Secretary General António Guterres and Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director General of the World Health Organization (WHO), also attended the meeting as special guests.

A joint statement released after the summit called the pandemic “the most serious global public health emergency since the end of World War II.”

He Wenping, a senior researcher with the China-Africa Institute, said full solidarity has yet to be achieved in the international community as the U.S. Government continues to level accusations against China as well as WHO.