I make this pledge to you, Abe told African leaders who gathered for the Tokyo International Conference on African Development. (Kyodo News, Japan)

African countries have called for more Public Private Partnership projects between their governments and Japanese entities. In a speech delivered by African Union Commission Chairperson Moussa Faki at the opening ceremony of the Seventh Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD 7), African states advanced that the Public Private Partnerships (PPP) model of development was the most ideal approach of achieving sustainable development on the continent. (Kenya Broadcasting Corp)

Chinese presence in Africa looms over opening of TICAD development conference in Yokohama. The seventh meeting of the Tokyo International Conference on African Development is set to open in Yokohama on Wednesday amid an intensifying race between China and other countries to expand their presence in Africa’s rapidly growing economies. (The Japan Times) Japan hosts development talks with African leaders this week, looking to boost its presence on the continent and offer an alternative to investments by an increasingly assertive China. (AFP)

On the sidelines of the plenary sessions, Abe held a series of bilateral meetings with participants, including South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres. (Nikkei, Japan)

Torrential rains have triggered floods and landslides in southwest Japan, killing at least two people and prompting authorities to order more than 900,000 people to leave their homes, while another million were advised to move to safety, reports said. (Al Jazeera, Qatar)

GAMBIA: Dawda Jawara, the first president of The Gambia following independence from Britain, died Tuesday at the age of 95, officials said. Current President Adama Barrow, in online comments, described Jawara’s death as a great loss to the country in particular and humanity in general. (Agence France Press)

KENYA: The Somali government has accused the Kenyan military of destroying mobile phone masts in the south of the country, where Kenyan troops are deployed in the fight against the Islamist militant group, al-Shabab. It wants the African Union to intervene and investigate the attacks which seem to be aimed at preventing the militants from communicating. (The Star, Kenya)

DR CONGO: The reactions of the international community after the appointment of Felix Tshisekedi’s first government are a major challenge for the DRC, which is seeking to renew ties with its partners, particularly the International Monetary Fund. MONUSCO said it was encouraged by the 17% of women in government, pointing out that this is even better than representation in the National Assembly or in provincial institutions. (RFI, France)

CLIMATE CHANGE: Next month’s three-day U.N. climate summit will highlight the urgency of taking immediate action to reduce global warming and focus on innovations that work, not just making wordy statements, the U.N. special envoy for the event said Tuesday. (AP)For Luis Alfonso de Alba, the special envoy for the United Nations Climate Action Summit, nothing outdoes the importance of urgent and concrete action in the struggle with climate change. (Xinhua News Agency, China)

Climate activists will escalate their protests next month in Washington DC, seeking to shut down traffic with blockades at key intersections to bring attention to the intensifying crisis. (The Guardian, UK)

COUNTERTERRORISM: A new international counterterrorism program that uses travel data has been underway since May, Under-Secretary-General and head the UN Counter-Terrorism Office Vladimir Voronkov said on Tuesday at the UN Security Council session. According to him, this is a multi-year, multi-million, multilateral program carried out jointly by the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee, UN Office on Drugs and Crime, the Communicative Technologies Office and the International Civil Aviation Organization. (TASS, Russia)

G7: In short, although the G7 remains an important intergovernmental economic organization, estrangement is more than apparent. With various internal contradictions and the rise of emerging powers, the global influence of G7 as a whole and all its members is declining fast. (Global Times, China, ed)

Source: UNIC Pretoria South Africa