German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock is continuing her two-day visit to West Africa in Ivory Coast.
The Green politician was welcomed at Abidjan airport on Tuesday by Foreign Minister Léon Kacou Adom after travelling from Senegal. A meeting with President Alassane Ouattara was planned later.
After the meeting with Adom, Baerbock will learn about the training of civilian and military security forces at an international counter-terrorism academy some 35 kilometres outside Abidjan. There she will see a simulated liberation of a village in the Sahel from terrorists.
Germany is helping to finance the infrastructure of the training centre with a contribution of €2.5 million ($2.7 million) and has also provided the money for a jetty.
The academy trains specialists from the civilian, police and military sectors in crisis management and counter-terrorism, focussing on tactics and hostage rescue. The German Federal Police’s special GSG9 unit also trains there regularly.
Located on the Gulf of Guinea, the Ivory Coast is the economic heavyweight of French-speaking West Africa with around 30 million inhabitants, and is the world’s largest cocoa producer.
Like its Sahel neighbours Ghana, Benin and Togo, the country is threatened by the spillover of Islamist terrorism from Mali and Burkina Faso, where militant groups are spreading, particularly in the border regions.
