Africa

Prospects for economic union in West Africa, at least among the CFA Franc Zone countries, are looking up. The Union Economique et Monétaire Ouest-Africaine is pushing ahead with...

Peter Hain's appointment as Britain's Minister of State for Africa is likely to push African concerns a few notches higher up the Whitehall totem pole.

President Jacques Chirac's four-country hurtle round West Africa (21-24 July) was a damp squib. He lacks the verve of his more cerebral predecessor François Mitterrand who had...

Those in Africa who'd hoped the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation's bombing of former Yugoslavia presaged a tougher line on rogue states and human rights abusers are disappointed. The...

The Netherlands has warned four African governments that it will halt aid if they don't improve their governance records, Africa Confidential has learned.

Amsterdam and Geneva have become favoured cities for conference organisers seeking highranking African delegates. An impressive array of ministers and power company managers is on the guest list...

The campaign against anti-personnel mines (APM) has grown fast. The Ottawa Convention banning them came into force on 1 March, when 134 governments had signed and 65 ratified...

British ministers talk boldly of 'militant humanitarianism' and 'defending civilians against terror'. They refer to Kosovo, but some African officials have asked their Western counterparts if such...

Along with Washington and Paris, London is a key city for Africa specialists in diplomacy, academia and business but they break cover less often than their American and...

For a time during Washington’s 16-18 March Africa Ministerial Conference, the capital’s political hatchets were buried and politicians, business people and bureaucrats applauded the administration’s efforts to bring...