Rally support for African initiatives - Prez Mahama urges Italy
President John Dramani Mahama has urged Italy to help make other European countries appreciate the African situation, in view of its long engagement with the continent.
He asked Italy to galvanise European countries to support various initiatives on the continent, such as the fight against terrorism, the quest for peace and stability and the development of migration policies.
President Mahama made the call at separate meetings with the Italian Prime Minister, Matteo Renzi, and President Sergio Mattarella in Rome Thursday.
The meetings, held behind closed doors, focused on deepening bilateral relations between the two countries. They also held discussions on a number of issues on which the two countries had shared values and positions.
Also discussed were Ghana's interest in leveraging Italy's experience in agriculture and agro-processing, piracy in the Gulf of Guinea, migration and human trafficking.
Stability
President Mahama, who is on a two-day official visit to Italy, reminded Italy that it had a stake in helping to restore stability to Libya because of its long-standing association with the North African country.
He also urged the world to work to ensure stability in other nations, saying that with stability, democracy would evolve and flourish.
President Mahama warned that the instability in north Africa could adversely affect the Sahel Region, West Africa and Central Africa.
Long relations
He noted the long years of cooperation between Ghana and Italy from the days of Ghana's first President, Dr Kwame Nkrumah.
He mentioned the large number of Italian civil engineering and construction firms operating in Ghana and said it attested to the ever growing relations between the two countries.
President Mahama said Italy's assistance to Ghana's private sector development efforts was worth recognising.
He added that a fund set up by Italy for the purpose continued to support the development of small and medium enterprises in Ghana.
Both the Italian Prime Minister and the President hailed the strong relations between the two countries and said every effort must be made to build on them.
They pledged Italy's continued support for Ghana's development effort.
