Portugal’s foreign minister will lead a panel on the blue economy at the African Union (AU) summit in Addis Ababa and hopes to discuss “worrying situations” of insecurity in Africa with his colleagues.
Thursday’s high-level policy dialogue on ocean governance and the blue economy is co-sponsored by Portugal, the African Union (AU) Commission and Comoros, the island nation that currently holds the AU presidency.
“We lead a group on the blue economy, a core theme of Portuguese foreign policy. The African continent is a continent with enormous potential that has yet to be realized in terms of the blue economy,” said Luse, the head of Portuguese diplomacy.
Joao Gomes Craviño will be in the Ethiopian capital on Wednesday and Thursday during the 44th session of the African Union Executive Council, which precedes the pan-African body’s annual summit on Saturday and Sunday.
As the AU prepares to present its priorities for the next five years and the European Union completes a five-year institutional cycle, the high-level dialogue “will help advance a mutually beneficial vision and set of shared priorities.” for Africa and Europe on Ocean Policy and Action,” says the meeting’s presentation document.
“This event will also pave the way for a sustainable collective future as Africa enters the second decade of its Agenda 2063, Europe enters a new policy cycle and we begin to prepare for the third United Nations Ocean Conference in 2025, giving follow-up measures. work done since the last edition, held in 2022 in Lisbon,” he also states.
On the sidelines of the meetings in Addis Ababa, the Portuguese minister planned meetings with colleagues from countries such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Algeria, Tanzania or the Comoros Islands, as well as African countries of the Community of Lusophone Countries (CPLP). ).
“The African continent is unfortunately going through extremely troubling times in terms of peace and security, and these will be the main topics of conversation: especially the Sahel, but also the area of Sudan, Libya and the Great Lakes region. – he said to Lusa.
João Gomes Craviño is also expected to meet with the new Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), Claver Gatete; with the African Union Commissioner for Peace and Security, Bankole Adoye, and with the African Union Commissioner for Agriculture, Rural Development, Blue Economy and Environment, the Angolan Josepha Sako.
African Union member states meet Saturday and Sunday in Addis Ababa for the organization’s usual annual summit, with this year’s summit likely to go down in history as one of the most tense due to a dispute between Algeria and Morocco, which are seeking to take the rotating chairmanship of the African Union. continental organization, which, taking into account geographical rotation, has now passed to North Africa.