Egypt & Arab-African Cooperation

* The Arabs and Africans celebrate the 30th anniversary of the con-vening of the first Arab African summit on Egypt's land.

* The 1977 summit codified for the first time the Arab-African coop-eration by issuing four basic documents defining the principles and goals of joint action and initiated its machineries, several of which are still operating until now.

* The Arab-African Cultural Institute has been lately inaugurated in Bamako. Periodical consultative meetings have been held between the Arab League General Secretariat and the African Union Commission.

* Joint Arab and African gatherings and forums emerged in the last two decades, reflecting the contribution of public sectors, as well as the Arab-African civil society's associations and unions.

The Arab and African circles celebrate in March 2007, the 30th anni-versary of the first Arab-African summit held in Cairo in March 1977. Egypt has been, along its old, modern and modern history, the link be-tween the Arabs and the African continent. It was African pioneer coun-try embracing Islam creed and Arab culture, through which many Arab transitions had prevailed. Due to its geographic position, it has strong ties with the African entity affecting and affected by it.

Its strong trade relations with the African countries has great impact on strengthening the Arab African relations. Through Egypt and the Red Sea, the Arab-Islamic effects vehemently swept Sudan.

When big numbers of Arabs embraced Islam, two significant results appeared:

First: The prevalence of Arab culture and language in big parts of the countries.

Second: The prevalence of Islam among Christian nationals and those who believe in some African creeds.

Those effects brought on the north of Sudan a great deal of cultural and social harmony. Hence, made it a centre of radiation of Islamic and Arab culture in the heart of the African continent. As to the south of Sudan, it was isolated from the north. When the Turkish Egyptian ad-ministration dominated that area for with object of trade, the Arab and Moslems penetrated it and Islam prevailed until it came under the Brit-ish dominance.

The Arab-African Relations in the Post-Independence Period

The Arab-African relations were strengthened in the 1950s after the independence of the Arab countries. As they witnessed great deal of coordination and solidarity in many issues. Egypt was the first country that offered financial, military, diplomatic and media backing to the Af-rican liberation movements, particularly after the eruption of the July Revolution.

Such coordination and solidarity covered issues considered by the United Nations and the Non-Alignment Movement. As the Arab and African countries struggled together against colonialism which settled in South Africa and Rhodesia.

After the October War, a new phase in the history of the Arab-African relations had started, characterized by the communications and consultations conducted between the Arab League and the OAU. The OAU ministerial council passed a special resolution on the Arab-African cooperation. It recommended the establishment of an Arab-African economic cooperation. An ad-hoc committee was formed and held its first meeting in Addis Ababa in 1973.

During the same period, the African countries supported the Arab struggle and called for an Israeli withdrawal from the occupied Arab territories. The OAU ministerial council issued in February 1975, the Addis Ababa Declaration, which confirmed that the core of the Middle East problem is the Palestinian cause. Besides, the African countries supported the Arab rights within the framework of the Security Council resolutions and the UN General Assembly.

On their part, the Arab countries condemned, within the framework of the Arab League, the racist regimes in Africa. In 1975, the league council issued a resolution providing that the liberation movements in the African continent are Arab-African issues. The Arabs have taken se-rious steps in cooperation with the African countries. They offered grants, loans and investments, established funds and dispatched ex-perts to Africa.

After the Arab Summit in Algeria in 1973, financial foundations had been established to boost Arab-African cooperation. They are: The Arab Fund for Technical Aid for the Arab-African Countries, the Arab Fund for loans in Africa, the Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa. The last two organs were merged in one organ.

* The Arab-African Economic and Financial Cooperation Declara-tion: Laying down a plan for joint economic and financial cooperation including several items; salient of which: encouraging technical coop-eration between the Arab and African countries, increasing bilateral fi-nancial aid, boosting the investment of Arab capital in the African coun-tries and others, and regulating work methods to achieve Arab-African cooperation.

Thus, the Arabs and Africans will have embarked upon achieving joint aspirations and ambitions in all domains. But, it waned by the end of the 70s and at the beginning of the 80s, where the Arab-African co-operation experiment went through a crisis that changed the nature of relations.

The first years of the 21st century have witnessed positive develop-ments of the future of the Arab-African cooperation. As the Arab Sum-mit in A'masn in March 2001called for reviving it, and the permanent committee for Arab-African cooperation held its 12th session in Algeria in April 2001, after a hiatus 10-year. It issued a statement that reflected the keenness of both sides to activate cooperation in the various do-mains, and upgrade the level of Arab-African action, so as to achieve full partnership.

The 1977 Summit has developed machineries for such cooperation; some of them are still functioning and others have been lately estab-lished such as the Arab-African Cultural Institute in Bamako (Mali). Pe-riodical consultative meetings were held between the Arab League Gen-eral Secretariat and the African Union Commission, that held their sec-ond session in Cairo on December 4-6,2006.

Besides that, joint Arab-African assemblies and forums have been held in the last two decades, reflecting the participation of popular sec-tors, as well as associations and unions of the Arab-African civil society.

Within the context of promoting such efforts, the second consultative meeting, discussed several drafts to overcome the complications hinder-ing the convening of the second Arab-African summit; salient of which were:

- To give free scope to both the Arab League Secretary General and Commissioner of the African Union, during the African Summit (Janu-ary 2007), to enhance the endeavourers aiming at holding the Arab-African Summit in 2007.

- To suggest the formation of a committee for drafting the final decla-ration and develop machineries of consultations between the two or-ganizations.

- To resume the meetings of the Arab-African permanent cooperation committee, or holding a troika meeting between the two organizations.

- To recommend the formation of committees of Arab and African ambassadors in Geneva, New York , Brussels, Addiss Ababa and Cairo, to hold regular consultative meetings to coordinate stands.

- To submit the establishment of an Arab-African forum which in-cludes elites of economists, commercial professionals, the civil society and academicians.

- The final revision of the new cooperation agreement between the Arab league and the African Union, as an alternative to the agreement concluded in 1986.

The call for resuming the convention of the permanent committee is the real starting point, where it implements and follows up the works and developments of the Arab-African cooperation in the various do-mains. There are two important projects waiting for the convention of the committee since long years.

They will boost integrated development between the Arab and African countries. First of which is establishing an Arab-African corporation for financing and investment, and the sec-ond is the agreement of setting up an Arab-African preferential com-mercial zone.

Within the scope of expanding cooperation between the Egyptian and Arab Funds for technical cooperation with Africa, Egypt held talks in 2006 with the Arab Fund for Technical Aid for African Countries. During these meetings, agreements were enforced to boost coordination between the Egyptian and Arab Funds, as well as the proposed projects.

The Arab Funds have also concluded cooperation agreements with many regional and international foundations, organizations and corpo-rations; such as the Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa, that provides Arab experts, and cooperates with the African Develop-ment Bank and the Islamic Bank for Development.

The Fund also cooperates with the foundations of the Arab-African civil society. As it signed a technical cooperation agreement with the Arab and African Journalists Union. It discusses also the establishment of advanced vocational training centres in some African countries.

The hand seeks in the future to conclude many agreement with relevant or-ganizations and foundations, and tends to expand the implementation of some projects in the African countries.