China is convening a Horn of Africa peace conference in Addis Ababa on June 20-21. In an earlier article titled "Xue Bing: Beijing Will Send Engineers, Not Weapons, to Horn of Africa" by Aggrey Mutambo, The East African interviewed Xue Bing, China's special envoy for the Horn of Africa.
In the interview, Xue Bing said in connection with Beijing's peace initiative "China will send out engineers and students. We don't send out weapons."
Comment: There seems to be a disconnect here. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute's Arms Transfers Database, China transferred from 2010 through 2021 the following dollar amounts of conventional weapons to countries in the Horn of Africa: Sudan $254 million, Ethiopia $81 million, Kenya $40 million, Djibouti $37 million, South Sudan $12 million, and Somalia $2 million. These figures do not include transfers of small arms and light weapons.
