The Saudi-African Economic Summit opened in Riyadh on Friday, in the presence of Prince Mohammed Ben Salmane Ben Abdelaziz Al Saoud, Crown Prince of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and leaders and heads of delegations from several African states.
Head of Government Aziz Akhannouch is leading the Moroccan delegation, representing King Mohammed VI, accompanied by Moroccan FM Nasser Bourita, and is partaking in three meetings, two of which are urgently related to the situation in Palestine.
The Moroccan delegation also includes Mustapha Mansouri, Morocco’s Ambassador to Riyadh, Mohamed Arrouchi, Morocco’s Ambassador-Permanent Representative to the African Union, and the Director of Mashreq, Gulf, Arab and Islamic Organizations at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Fouad Akhrif, the Director of Greater Maghreb and Arab Maghreb Union Affairs and the African Union, Hassan Boukili, as well as executives from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Morocco’s missions in Cairo and Addis Ababa.
This summit aims to establish strategic cooperation between the Saudi and African parties in the fields of economy and investment to serve the common interests, development and stability of the countries of the Continent.
The high-level meeting also aims to define areas of cooperation and reach a common vision to move forward in consolidating bilateral and multilateral relations between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and African states.
Morocco continues to place developments in the Palestinian issue at the forefront of its recent diplomatic efforts, by the attending shuttle international and regional meetings in both Paris and Saudi Arabia.
In the French capital, Fouad Yazoug, Ambassador and Director General of the Moroccan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, called for “an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip.”
Morocco’s efforts come in light of growing global concern over the dire humanitarian situation in Gaza, and persistent Israeli attacks which threatens the lives of millions of civilians, including children, the sick and the injured in hospitals, as the death toll rises above 10,000 casualties.
The Security Council has previously failed to restrain Tel Aviv from its plans to continue the war on Gaza, while the international meetings in which Morocco participates and the mediations put on the table by world powers represent the remaining hope for ending one of the largest humanitarian crises, according to the United Nations.
In addition, a cluster of Arab countries attempted to issue a joint statement on the ongoing violence in the Strip alongside a number of Western nations, but to no avail, as the western block contested the use of the word “aggression,” learns MoroccoLatestNews.