Matsumoto vows to double Japan's ODA target for Africa as pledged

DAKAR, May 1 Kyodo -
Japanese Foreign Minister Takeaki Matsumoto said Sunday his country will steadily implement its pledges to increase aid to Africa despite a cut in overall foreign aid to help finance reconstruction from the March 11 quake-tsunami disaster.
At a ministerial meeting to follow up on the Tokyo International Conference on African Development that opened in the Senegalese capital Dakar, which became the first major international conference Japan organizes after the disaster, Matsumoto also explained the ongoing efforts to stabilize the nuclear crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant.
When the TICAD was last held in Yokohama in 2008, Japan vowed to double its Africa-bound official development assistance to $1.8 billion a year by 2012 and provide up to $4 billion in low-interest yen loans over five years.
Co-chairing the two-day event on the first day with Senegalese counterpart Madicke Niang, the Japanese minister also thanked participants from some 50 African nations for supporting Japan in trying to overcome the catastrophe that chiefly hit northeastern Japan.
The participants are expected to release a joint statement Monday featuring the voice of Africa on the issue of global warming to be reflected in an upcoming U.N. conference on climate change in Durban, South Africa, later this year, Japanese officials said.
As part of his four-nation trip, Matsumoto visited Washington on Friday and Berlin on Saturday, and is slated to leave Dakar for Brussels later Sunday.