The India-Africa Forum Summit, scheduled for May 28-31 in New Delhi, has been postponed due to concerns over the Ebola virus outbreak in Africa. The Ministry of External Affairs announced that new dates will be finalised in consultation with African nations.
Keen to capitalise on the growing geopolitical support from African nations after the recently concluded G20 Summit, India is working with the African Union to hold the fourth India-Africa Forum Summit later this year in Kenya's Nairobi, sources said. Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to attend the mega meet along with as many as 50 African leaders, they added. First held in New Delhi in 2008, the India-Africa Forum Summit marked India's initial diplomatic efforts to seek a comprehensive partnership with the African bloc of nations as a whole, at a time when China had begun its own outreach.
India and Africa on Wednesday declared their support to each other for a permanent seat in the expanded United Nations Security Council and favoured reforms of the world body to make it more representative and democratic.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Ethiopia on a bilateral visit, engaging with Ethiopian leadership to strengthen partnerships in various sectors. He was warmly welcomed by Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed Ali and participated in cultural events, highlighting the strong ties between the two nations.
He also offered India's experiences of participative political institutions, local governance, media and civil society with Africa.
Ready to share their natural resources, African countries on Tuesday sought greater Indian investments, particularly from the private sector, to boost economic growth in the continent.
She lamented that Africa despite being the largest continent in terms of number of the countries and India, which has has one-sixth of the world's population, still don't have permanent membership of the UNSC.
The Addis Ababa Declaration, which was adopted at the end of the second Africa-India Forum Summit, called on all countries to ensure that acts of cross-border terrorism do not occur and their territories are not made a base for terrorists. Both India and Africa condemned piracy and terrorism in all forms and called for active prosecution of persons who subscribe to such heinous crimes. "We unequivocally condemn terrorism in all its forms and manifestations," it stated
The 68-year-old influential Arab leader will grace the Republic Day celebrations on January 26. Sisi is accompanied by a high-level delegation.
Concerned over disturbing trends in global economy, India and African nations on Wednesday called for increasing economic cooperation to combat the menace of rising food and energy prices.
India and Africa on Wednesday asked the developed counties to take "ambitious actions" to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and also provide finance and technology to the developing counties so that they could effectively address the impact of climate change.
India and Egypt on Wednesday decided to elevate their ties to the level of strategic partnership with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and visiting Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi vowing to expand ties in areas of defence and security, trade and counter-terror cooperation.
Narendra Modi is to hold summit-level meetings with the heads of more than 50 African nations on Thursday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a strong pitch for deeper ties in key areas of counter-terrorism, climate change and UN reforms.
Asserting that there was growing scourge of terrorism in view of fast growing linkages of terrorist groups across the globe, India on Tuesday strongly advocated stepped up cooperation through intelligence exchange and training with 54 African countries.
India is on a rediscovery of Africa. India and Africa, as maritime neighbours have an ancient tradition of trading links. But a modern day engagement is taking shape between them with the Indian government going ahead with a Focus Africa policy for a structured interaction with all regions of the African continent. The second Africa-India Forum Summit is to be held in Addis Ababa next week.
India pledged an assistance of USD 30 million (Rs 199 crore) for the initiative that brings together developed and developing countries.
Africa is second only to West Asia as a net exporter of oil.
"In India's development cooperation, we will be guided by our partners' development priorities. Our assistance does not create indebtedness and is without conditionalities," he said at the 44th Annual Meeting of the G-77 Foreign Ministers on Thursday, in a veiled reference to China's loans which has led to debt-traps in some countries.
Prime Minister Anerood Jugnauth has termed the issue as an aberration in the "very special" ties with India and hoped that revision of their tax treaty won't harm its interests.
Modi emphasised on deeper India-Africa partnership on clean energy.
Speaking to the Indian community, he asked them to join the campaigns launched by Prime Minister Modi such as 'Digital India', 'Startup India, Stand up India', 'Clean India Mission', 'Smart Cities' etc.
Finance Minister had announced the scheme in the Union Budget.
External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, who held extensive talks with Egyptian leadership on Monday, proposed to step up exchange of information and coordination to combat terrorism, both at the regional as well as global level
'Our countrymen should be made aware of the need to be polite and friendly to our African guests.' 'They should know the dictum, athithi devo bhava, whether they are black or white,' says Ambassador T P Sreenivasan, who once served as India's high commissioner to Kenya.
