AU Summit: FM Reaffirms Morocco’s Commitment to Promote Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy for Africa’s Development

Morocco, under the High Vision of HM King Mohammed VI, is committed to promoting peace and development in Africa through South-South cooperation in the field of peaceful uses of nuclear energy, Minister of Foreign Affairs, African Cooperation and Moroccan Expatriates Nasser Bourita reaffirmed Saturday in Addis Ababa, on the sidelines of the 36th African Union Summit. In an address read on his behalf by the Director of the United Nations and International Organizations at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, African Cooperation and Moroccan Expatriates Redouane Houssaini, during the ministerial meeting organized by the Executive Secretariat of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) and the African Nuclear Energy Commission (AFCONE), Bourita expressed the Kingdom’s full support for the joint action plan of the CTBTO and AFCONE, as well as its willingness to strengthen its implementation through exchanging experience and best practices with African states. In this context, Bourita congratulated the new AFCONE Executive Secretary Enobot AGBORAW (Cameroon) and assured him of Morocco’s full support for his efforts to revitalize the governance of the Commission to take into account the Continent’s real needs in terms of peaceful uses of nuclear energy, in the framework of its partnership with CTBTO. Morocco, as a member of the Peace and Security Council of the African Union, is firmly committed to supporting this new partnership dynamic between AFCONE and CTBTO, said the Minister. As part of its multifaceted action to achieve the goals of Agenda 2063, the Kingdom, which has expertise and experience proven, places itself as a reliable and credible partner of AFCONE and CTBTO in the training of French and English-speaking African experts in the field of civil and scientific applications of the International Monitoring System of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), particularly in the areas of tsunami warnings, nuclear and radiological accidents, and civil aviation, which fall within the AFCONE mandate. On the operational level, the Minister made three concrete proposals for action within the framework of this partnership, namely the establishment of regional excellence centers, the mobilization of adequate and predictable resources for capacity building of African States, and the scaling up of training activities in the framework of a triangular cooperation Morocco -CTBTO/AFCONE -African States. This ministerial meeting, the first of its kind between CTBTO and AFCONE, was attended by Namibia’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Rwanda’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, the AU Commissioner for Political Affairs and Peace and Security, the CTBTO Executive Secretary, and the AFCONE Executive Secretary. All ministers and participants in the meeting welcomed Morocco’s commitment and concrete action to ensure the universalization of the CTBT in Africa and the promotion of civil and scientific uses of nuclear energy, within the framework of the action led by AFCONE. CTBTO is the organization in charge of implementing the verification regime of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, once it enters into force. For its part, AFCONE is the Secretariat of the Pelindaba Treaty establishing the African Nuclear Weapons Free Zone. Morocco became a State Party to this Treaty after its ratification in March 2022.