AFRICA-ASIA CONFIDENTIAL

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Africa-Asia Confidential is a monthly newsletter reporting on politics, economics and diplomacy between the two continents. It focuses on the increasing strategic ties between Africa and Asia, and their implications. Africa-Asia Confidential is essential reading for those who need to know about the latest developments in diplomatic and economic relations between the two continents. The lead article in every edition is free to read at www.africa-asia-confidential.com, where you can also download or request a sample edition or purchase an issue. Here below are the headlines from the latest issue.

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AFRICA-ASIA CONFIDENTIAL April 2009 - Volume 2 No 7
AFRICA | CHINA | INDIA: THE BATTLE FOR THE INDIAN OCEAN
Competition for strategic advantage in the world's most important shipping lanes draws Africa and Asia into a regional standoff
For the next few decades, the Indian Ocean will be the setting for competition between three great powers: the United States adjusting to an increasingly multipolar world, and the rising military and economic powers of India and China.

India defines the stakes clearly in its 2007 Maritime Military Strategy paper: 'Whosoever controls the Indian Ocean, dominates Asia. In the 21st century, the destiny of the world will be decided upon its waters.' That is no over-statement: globalisation depends on the cheap shipment of seabound containers: more than 50% of the world's container traffic sails the Indian Ocean, as does 70% of the world's petroleum products. The Indian Ocean's strategic importance as the world's most important oil shipping lane will increase still further over the next three decades, when higher energy consumption by India and China will account for more than half the growth of world energy consumption. Almost all China and India's imported energy requirements - whether oil from Africa and the Persian Gulf or coal from Mozambique and South Africa - are transported across the Indian Ocean.

Currently, there is no hegemonic power with dominion over the Indian Ocean and that is unlikely to change in the short-term as the region gives the first indications of how a multipolar world might look.
Read this article now and view the accompanying map: Great Power Competition in the Indian Ocean

SOMALIA | PIRACY: SOMALIA TESTS MARITIME SOLIDARITY
The international anti-piracy mission off the coast of Somalia is the type of cooperative mission that the United States sees as helpful to reduce the strain on its overstretched military. The Combined Task Force 151 (CTF 151) mission in the Gulf of Aden has had some success but has not convinced India and China to join forces.

CHINA | INDIA | UNITED STATES: WASHINGTON ADJUSTS TO THE CHINDIA FACTOR
A US State Department official said in 2005 that the US wanted to 'help India become a major world power in the 21st century. We understand fully the implications, including military implications, of that statement.' In 2007, the US Navy announced that it would seek to improve its position in the Western Pacific and Indian Oceans, redirecting resources from the Atlantic, signalling a strong shift in strategy. The US strategic rivalry with China means that Beijing's armed forces attract more interest than India's. The US has not sounded alarms about India's naval modernisation as it has about China's.

ZAMBIA | CHINA | INDIA: A SHAKE-OUT AFTER THE CRASH
China and India want to snap up assets as metal markets hit the floor and the mining houses sack workers
Western mining houses are pulling out of Zambia due to the copper price slump, leaving Chinese and Indian investors to battle over the abandoned assets. As the copper price crashed - from a high of US$8,675 per tonne in July 2008 to $2,800 in December - companies started closing down. The first was Luanshya Copper Mine, run by Israeli Beny Steinmetz's Global Resources and Switzerland's International Mineral Resources, in December. LCM is leaving some $200 million in debts to the new owners. Glencore and First Quantum's Mopani copper mine announced that it was laying off 1,000 workers on 6 May.

ANGOLA| CHINA: OIL, VOTES AND BEIJING
Luanda tries to shore up its finances as export revenues tumble; China's offer of credit becomes more important
The combination of lower world oil prices, tighter credit and production cuts has increased Luanda's reliance on its countertrade credits with China. As Angola holds the presidency of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Country, it will have to stick to the organisation's production cuts. Yet stopping many of the construction projects and the jobs they create is not an option for President José Eduardo dos Santos who is due to face elections this year.

Briefings... Briefings... Briefings... Briefings... Briefings... Briefings...

CHINA| AFRICA: NOT THE PROMISED LAND
China would not be taking up tracts of land in Africa to meet its domestic food requirements insisted Beijing's Deputy Agriculture Minister Niu Dun in April, but reports on the ground suggest that Chinese companies are rapidly expanding agricultural investment projects. Deputy Minister Niu's public statement reflects pressure from Chinese nationalists, who see the country's dependence on food imports as a strategic weakness, and from African activists, who argue it represents a Chinese imitation of Western neocolonial commercial arrangements. Niu distinguished between China's needs and those of South Korea, following the collapse of Daewoo's bids to secure production rights over half of Madagascar's arable land. In fact, China's needs are much greater and politically urgent than South Korea's.

GUINEA | CHINA: CONTRACT CONFUSION
The junta leader Captain Moussa Dadis Camara's order that all mining licences are subject to immediate revocation if the government does not approve of their development plans has added more confusion to Guinea's troubled mining sector. At the same time, negotiations for a proposed US$20 billion Chinese countertrade deal have collapsed.

SOUTH AFRICA | INDIA: FRIENDS IN THE RIGHT PLACES
Just before President Jacob Zuma's inauguration on 9 May, India's state-owned National Mineral Development Corporation (NMDC) signed a commercial cooperation agreement with the Congress of South African Trade Unions' (Cosatu) Kopano Ke Matla investment company. Founded in 1997, Kopano (Sotho for 'unity is strength') is a Black Economic Empowerment company. Its founder, Tumelo Motsisi, now a millionaire, defined its mission from early on: 'The driving objective within Cosatu is the ultimate seizure of economic power from a few powerhouses to the majority.'

TAIWAN | CHINA | AFRICA: WITH YOUR PERMISSION
On 7 May, Taiwan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs released a long-delayed white paper on foreign aid confirming what Taipei's allies are keenly aware of: Taiwan's foreign aid has dropped in the last year. Overseas development assistance to Taiwan's 23 allies was US$430 mn. in 2008, or 0.11% of gross domestic product, down from 0.14% in 2007. The loss of ties with Malawi in December 2007 accounts for some of the decline. Of this aid, 66% went to infrastructure development and 11% to technical assistance, with education, humanitarian assistance and other programmes making up the balance.

Who's who... Who's who... Who's who... Who's who... Who's who... Who's who...

HIROFUMI NAKASONE: Foreign Minister, Japan

YUAN NANGSHENG: China's Ambassador to Zimbabwe

KIM YONG-NAM: Chairman, Presidium of the Supreme People's Assembly, North Korea

THAKSIN SHINAWATRA: Former Prime Minister (2001-2006) Thailand


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