AU commission deputy chief hails China's continued support in battle against COVID-19

The Deputy Chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission, Kwesi Quartey, has hailed China's measures and efforts to handle the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, and its continued support to Africa in the battle against the epidemic.

This came during the meeting on Thursday between the Deputy Chairperson of the AU Commission and Chinese Ambassador to AU, Liu Yuxi, at the AU headquarters in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa.

They touched on ways of consolidating deliberations towards increased collaboration between AU and China in the fight against COVID-19 in Africa, according to a statement that Quartey posted on his Facebook.

The meeting between the two sides was part of efforts by the AU Commission to contain and minimize the impact of COVID-19 pandemic, aiming at enhancing collaboration between AU and China to combat COVID-19 in Africa, at the bilateral as well as on a coordinated continental scale.

Stating that one of the major effects of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic is the massive disruption of the global supply chain, he said many countries are on a full or partial shutdown, while medical consumables needed to tackle the pandemic are in increasingly short supply.

"The decisive manner in which the Government of China is handling the outbreak of the pandemic has caught the attention of the WHO and the international media," he said, indicating that his meeting with the Chinese envoy was therefore to discuss how China could facilitate the procurement of needed medical supplies for the continent.

The two sides discussed how to deepen cooperation on the area of public health and to mitigate the socio-economic impact of COVID-19 on the African continent and its people.

The Chinese ambassador to AU said China has placed a high value on its relationship with Africa, and that Africa has always stood by China and vice-versa.

The Deputy Chairperson of the AU Commission reiterated that the Africa Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, which is the AU technical health arm, through its regional collaboration centers, had, before the first case was reported on the continent, trained health personnel from all over the continent in readiness to fight such a pandemic.

(CGTN)