🤞Trying to take a short weekend break from policy & present a academic paper, “Graceful Seasoned Speech: The Unrealized Promise of Anglicanism’s Contribution to International Affairs,” at today’s opening session of The John Wesley Institute’s “ #Anglicanism in the Public Square” symposium.

The new #USA 🇺🇸 National Defense Strategy by Biden admin mentions #Africa just 3 times (!) in 80 pages, focuses on #VEO threats & says little new other than explicitly acknowledge “efforts to disrupt malign #PRC 🇨🇳 & #Russia 🇷🇺 activities on the continent.” defense.gov/News/News-Stor…

Thanks to Joshua Meservey & Heritage Foundation for hosting SFA (Oxford) Ltd CEO Henk de Coop, HSFlegal Africa Chair Peter Leon & me for a lively discussion on #Africa 's potential as a solution for the #USA 🇺🇸's #CriticalMinerals #SupplyChain challenges. See the video: youtu.be/cJBIc4R1Bj0

The Financial Times’s Andres Schipani offers a portrait of the overlapping conflicts over mineral & other resources in the eastern #DRC 🇨🇩 that have displaced a total of more than 5.5 million Congolese, the largest recorded humanitarian crisis of its kind in #Africa . ft.com/content/261257…

Returning from leading a #USA 🇺🇸 interagency team to #Mauritania 🇲🇷, #Mali 🇲🇱, #Niger 🇳🇪 & #BurkinaFaso 🇧🇫 Under Secretary Victoria Nuland Victoria Nuland says that the security situation has deteriorated in the #Sahel since the arrival of #Russia 🇷🇺’s. #WagnerGroup .
lemonde.fr/afrique/articl…

The #USA 🇺🇸 & #Japan 🇯🇵 create a partnership with #Ghana 🇬🇭 to support the West African country’s deployment of small modular reactors - a good example of the potential for U.S. strategic collaboration with allies in #Africa . U/S of State for Arms Control & Int'l Security Office of Nuclear Energy METI, Japan
state.gov/united-states-…

Kudos to Department of State for finally establishing a channel for diplomacy with the #subnational entities which, as I noted some years ago, “are the primary means through which African states manage...the immense... diversity found within their...frontiers.” See atlanticcouncil.org/in-depth-resea…

The Department of State launch of a website on for the #USA 🇺🇸- #Africa Leaders Summit with no substantive content, but which can be shared on social media, in all its vacuous splendor, is iconic on so many levels of the Biden admin’s approach to foreign policy in general, not just Africa.

Following a similar decision by the #USA 🇺🇸 nearly one year ago & citing “reforms undertaken,” the #EU 🇪🇺 has, on the recommendation of Josep Borrell Fontelles, lifted sanctions imposed in 2015 on three #Burundi 🇧🇮 officials, including current PM Gervais Ndirakobuca. Bureau du Premier Ministre MAECD

Good résumé of #Africa ’s frustration ahead of #COP27 : “While failing to fulfill their own commitments...the world’s richest nations are pressuring African countries not to develop their natural resources to conserve...habitats and avoid future warming.” bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

Thursday, Oct. 27, 10:30 AM EDT, in-person & virtual: Joshua Meservey hosts SFA (Oxford) Ltd CEO Henk de Hoop, HSFlegal Africa Chair Peter Leon & me Heritage Foundation to discuss “Can #Africa Be Part of the Solution to America’s #CriticalMinerals #SupplyChain Problems?” heritage.org/africa/event/c…

I am in the Bailiwick of #Jersey 🇯🇪, #ChannelIslands , for a corporate board meeting - my first visit to this Crown Dependency which, with its sister the Bailiwick of #Guernsey 🇬🇬, constitute the last remnant of the ancient Duchy of #Normandy where #England 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿's monarch still reigns.

It took only 74 years, but the United Nations🇺🇳 finally asked #Israel 🇮🇱 to take the lead in negotiating an #UNGA resolution. Israeli Amb. Ambassador Gilad Erdan גלעד ארדן will work alongside Amb. Omar Hilale of #Morocco 🇲🇦 to prepare the draft on pandemic preparedness. #AbrahamAccords Israel Mission to UN Permanent Mission of Morocco to the UN

Merci à mes amis SE Evariste Ndayishimiye, Amb. Albert SHINGIRO et Ambassador Liberata Mulamula pour la superbe vidéo célébrant les liens profondes entre le #Burundi 🇧🇮 et la #Tanzanie 🇹🇿. Ne attendez pas que je fasse de tels mouvements rythmiques lors de ma prochaine visite! Ntare Rushatsi House MAECD MFA Tanzania

#WeekendRead - Kudos to Elbridge Colby for being one of the few foreign policy thinkers today to also make an ethical case for his proposed strategy. “A foreign policy that does not reckon with reality, however high-minded or pure in intent, is not moral.” firstthings.com/article/2022/1…

ICYMI - Bloomberg reports that #Gabon 🇬🇦 is negotiating with The Nature Conservancy to refinance its $700 million eurobond, using the proceeds fund marine conservation efforts in the largest such debt swap ever - an interesting & creative approach. Prof. Lee White CBE bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

Thanks to ITV News int’l affairs editor Rageh Omaar for hosting me at the Reform Club, London, for a great conversation about prospects for & challenges in #Africa in general and #Somaliland in particular, including the roles that the #USA 🇺🇸, the #UK 🇬🇧 & other partners can play.