Merkel turns to Africa to curb migrant flow
BERLIN:
German Chancellor Angela Merkel yesterday wrapped up a week of Africa diplomacy aimed at slowing the flow of migrants to Europe from a continent battered by conflict and poverty. She will host Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, having also met Chad’s head of state Idriss Deby two days earlier following a three-day whirlwind tour of Mali, Niger and Ethiopia, the seat of the African Union. As Germany, Europe’s top destination for people fleeing war and misery, looks to chair the G20 next year, it has pledged to step up efforts to help Africa and fight the causes of the mass migration.
“I think we will need to take a vastly greater interest in the destiny of Africa,” Merkel said at the start of her first major Africa trip in five years. “The well-being of Africa is in Germany’s interest.” Data backs up that notion - while most asylum-seekers in Germany so far this year came from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, Germany has also taken in over 13,000 Eritreans and thousands from other African countries. More than 10,000 came from Nigeria, the oil-rich economic giant now grappling with a plunge in crude prices and the Boko Haram jihadist insurgency that has claimed over 20,000 lives and spilled into Cameroon, Chad and Niger.
‘Life-Threatening Journeys’
Merkel on her three-nation trip repeatedly warned Africans against crossing dangerous deserts and seas for an uncertain future in Europe. “Often it’s the young people who head for Europe with completely wrong ideas,” she said in Addis Ababa. “They risk a life-threatening journey without knowing what’s waiting for them or even whether they’ll be able to stay.” The best way to stop the mass flight would be to encourage greater stability in their countries of origin, Merkel said, picking up on the theme of an EU-African Summit held in Malta last year.
The list of goals is ambitious - promoting democracy, fighting terrorism and fostering prosperity through investment. In Mali, Merkel said it was crucial that “African countries don’t lose their brightest minds” needed to develop their own countries. Merkel said that as chair of the Group of 20, Berlin would next year host a conference on investment in Africa, especially in the transport and energy sectors.