Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will visit Namibia this week in a bid to strengthen ties with the resource-rich nation.
It’s his second and final stop in Africa on a five-nation tour that began in Ghana last week, sandwiched around a visit to Brazil for the BRICS summit. In Namibia, Modi is expected to discuss access to critical minerals such as cobalt and lithium, uranium supplies, and the diamond trade — with the African country home to rich deposits in all.
The visit “is being seen as pivotal in India’s quest for critical minerals essential to new-age technologies and electric vehicles,” reported The Times of India. The Indian premier is also likely to emphasize the idea of south-south cooperation during his tour. “He’ll want to refute notions that India is a perennial underdog or a neo-colonialist in a new scramble for Africa,” wrote a researcher in The Conversation.