According to the eight new measures announced by Wen, China will help Africa build up financing capacity, and will provide US$10 billion in concessional loans to African countries and support Chinese financial institutions in setting up a special loan of 1 billion dollars for small- and medium-sized African businesses.

The new commitments, which made headlines across the African media the next day, epitomized the all-weather friendship based on sincerity, equality, pragmatism, efficiency and mutual-trust. These values merit ovation since the economic turmoil, though in remission, still festers.

China's approach to Africa has long been habitually disliked by a handful of sceptics, so no wonder the forum was once overshadowed by the accusations of "exploiting" and "neocolonialism" against the country. These accusations, while sensible prima facie, are far less persuasive than imagined.

China's dependence on African oil is still dwarfed by Western energy giants, according to the latest statistics. Now China is not the largest importer of Africa's oil. Its import takes up only 13 percent of Africa's oil export and its investment in Africa's oil and natural gas accounts for less than 6.25 percent of the global investment in this field.

History tells us that China's relations with the continent have gone beyond makeshift considerations on energy or other resources, as a Chinese poem cited by Premier Wen said, "A time-honored friendship is like the gold. After repeated smelting, it keeps its true color."

Nine years after the first version, the FOCAC has become an effective platform for China-Africa dialogue, an engine that powers bilateral cooperation and a new brand of South-South relations. What the whole world has witnessed after the Beijing Summit was consistent, efficient and solid actions. It has every reason to expect more in the future.

(Xinhua News Agency November 12, 2009)