From Bloomberg:
Chinese President Hu Jintao will bring billions of dollars in investments and loans to eight African countries this week — his second trip to Africa in a year — in a bid to secure resources from oil to gold.
He may also try to persuade Sudan’s Umar Hassan al-Bashir to accept UN peacekeepers to help solve the crisis in the country’s Darfur region, which has killed more than 200,000 people in the past four years.
Hu’s wooing of Africa through trade, loans and direct investments in its oil and mineral industries has won it diplomatic allies and secured supplies of natural resources. It has also put the spotlight on China’s role in blocking UN sanctions condemning Sudan for the violence in Darfur. [Full Text]
