March 6, 2018

Washington's top diplomat set off for Africa on Tuesday to tour countries that form a new theater for competition with America's ambitious great power rival China. 

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s trip to Ethiopia, Kenya, Djibouti, Chad and Nigeria will take him to new battlefields in the United States’ long war against Islamist extremism.

But looming over the journey will be a different and arguably more important long-term challenge — the rise of China as an economic and diplomatic power to rival the West.

In a low-key speech to the George Mason University in Virginia before setting off, Tillerson insisted on the importance of Africa to America’s interests.

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https://citizen.co.za/news/news-africa/1847375/us-africa-diplomacy/