China's President Xi Jinping said the Belt and Road Initiative would be harmonized with the African Union's Agenda 2063 and the United Nations' 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. Speaking to visiting African leaders on Monday, he pledged another $60 billion in investment in the continent and added the equivalent package he announced three years before has either been delivered or arranged, Xinhua reported.
The most populous nation won't interfere in African countries' development strategies or internal affairs and it doesn't deliver assistance with "political strings, according to the president. He told participants at the Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) that some partner countries would be exempt from debt on interest-free loans due by the end of the year. Xi stressed plans for joint work in industrial promotion, infrastructure connectivity, trade facilitation, green development and military aid to the African Union.
The $60 billion pledge, he added, is made of $15 billion in grants, interest-free loans and concessions, $20 billion in credit, a $10 billion development fund and $5 billion for financing imports from Africa, while domestic companies are "encouraged" to invest $10 billion in Africa in the next three years.
