Columbia International Affairs Online: Working Papers

CIAO DATE: 03/2014

Mauritania and Newly Emerging Economies in Africa Turkey and China

Fouad Farhaoui

January 2013

International Strategic Research Organization (USAK)

Abstract

We are delighted to introduce the latest USAK Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies report, “Mauritania and Newly Emerging Economies in Africa; Turkey and China”, which evaluates Mauritanian relations with Turkey and China, two increasingly dominant actors in this country. After laying out the country’s profile from various perspectives, the report chronicles the overall progress of economic and political relations between Turkey and Mauritania, as well as making a review of relations in the areas of military and national security. The question of how economic relations with Turkey can be further developed is also discussed separately. The report which lays out the various economic resources of the country that trigger the interests of emerging powers has also a separate section on China, which has continually extended its political, cultural and economic spheres of influence in all over Africa. In this sense, the report also provides a brief and valuable analysis of Mauritania’s relations with China. This section is important in the sense of providing a yardstick to see in a comparative manner how much Turkey’s relations with Mauritania have in fact developed.