Europe, Africa look to build new world order

Economic Times | December 9, 2007

LISBON: A century after European states carved Africa into a series of colonies, Europe is looking to create a new world order - in alliance with Africa.

"Imagine if we showed that with 1.5 billion people and 80 countries - almost half the UN membership - we can make a real impact, both regionally and as global partners," European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso told the summit of the European and African Unions in Lisbon Saturday.

The two continents should create a "genuine partnership of solidarity and mutual respect which defends the priorities of Africa and its specific interests" in global issues, Egypt's President Hosni Mubarak told the 26 European and 53 African leaders.

The EU-AU summit - the first in seven years and only the second in history - has been hailed by both sides as a chance to launch a "new relationship" between the continents.

And one key aim of that relationship, according to the agreement jointly drawn up by representatives of the two organisations, is to develop "common responses to global challenges" in international fora - including the UN.

"The EU and AU together represent 80 countries. Eighty votes at the UN is a very big power bloc, so there's no doubt that more comprehensive cooperation could be mutually beneficial," John Kotsopoulos, an Africa expert at the Brussels-based European Policy Centre, told DPA.

The two decades since the end of the Cold War have been marked by the emergence of powerful global players such as China, India, Brazil and Russia - states with huge populations, growing financial reserves and immensely powerful corporations.

Africa is already the scene of their rivalry, as the new great powers compete for dwindling energy supplies and raw materials.

"Africa is becoming the new 'grand chessboard' on which the world's great powers manoeuvre. China, the US, Australia, India and Malaysia are more and more pushing elbow to elbow to take control of mineral, oil and gas deposits in Africa," EU Aid and Development Commissioner Louis Michel warned ahead of the summit.

And while some African leaders fear that their continent risks becoming the renewed battleground of the world's rising powers, their European counterparts worry that those same powers could sideline Europe on major international issues.

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