BEIJING, (Reuters) – Chinese President Xi Jinping said yesterday strong China-Eritrea relations were key to bolstering peace in the Horn of Africa region and pursuing mutually beneficial development, speaking at a meeting in Beijing with his Eritrean counterpart.
Eritrea has strategic importance for China given its location on the Red Sea, one of the world’s key shipping corridors with access to both to the Suez Canal and Europe to the north and the Indian Ocean to the southeast. Eritrea, a reclusive country that won independence from Ethiopia in 1993 after a long war, also shares a border with tiny Djibouti, where the Chinese military set up its first overseas naval base in 2017.
Xi, speaking to Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki in Beijing’s Great Hall of the People after a guard of honour ceremony in Tiananmen Square, said China and Eritrea “share a deep bond of friendship (in) an uncertain and unstable world”.
“A strong China-Eritrea relationship is not only in line with the common and long-term interests of both countries, but also for maintaining regional peace,” Xi said.
Last year China named senior diplomat Xue Bing to a newly created post of special envoy for the Horn of Africa, a geopolitically sensitive, conflict-wracked region where Beijing has significant investments and, along with ally Russia, has been competing with Western powers for influence.
