China Pledges $10B Credit, 1B Vaccine Doses For Africa

China has pledged one billion COVID-19 vaccine doses and $10-billion credit to African countries during the recently-held Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, an annual summit of Chinese and African leaders.

Photo Insert: China's vaccine diplomacy continues

Held virtually in Senegal, Chinese President Xi Jinping made the big promise in his video appearance.

Chinese coverage focused on infrastructure projects’ success, but embarrassing stories broke over or just before the summit as Chinese firms played a key role in former Congolese leader Joseph Kabila’s looting of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, including funneling $55 million in bribes to Kabila’s entourage through a shell company established by state-owned giants China Railway Group and Sinohydro, James Palmer wrote for Foreign Policy.

“That speaks to one of the key fears I’ve heard from citizens in countries with heavy Chinese investment, mostly in Central Asia but also Africa: that mega-projects would be a way for their own elites to steal and launder money with Chinese aid,” Palmer added.

“The other fear is debt traps, sometimes said to be overblown. A Ugandan parliamentary probe into an airport deal concluded that provisions in a contract with China’s Export-Import Bank, which remains non-public, were unfair and discriminatory and could be used by China to seize the airport.

China denied the claims, but some local media turned this into a claim that China had already seized the airport,” Palmer stressed.

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