Pine Forest Charter School’s Cedar Avenue campus became a center of cultural exchange Friday when 25 young African leaders visited the campus for a day of community service. The African visitors are recipients of the Mandela Washington Fellowship, part of President Barack Obama’s Young African Leadership Initiative. The program selects 1,000 applicants, between ages 25 and 35 from various countries in Africa to attend a seven-week program in the United States.

India now sees Africa as a promising market for Indian goods, services, and investments. This is evident in the government’s recent concerted focus on the India-Africa relationship—high profile visits by top leaders to African countries, a recasting of India’s development diplomacy, and an attempt to match action to past promises. [...] At the same time, India’s development diplomacy for the continent has been through a strategic shift. ​

The United States must pursue a different approach in helping stabilize Somalia following the appointment of the first U.S. Ambassador to Somalia in more than 25 years, said a former Somali diplomat and respected foreign policy analyst. Abukar Arman, the former Special Representative of Somalia to Washington, said Wednesday the United States has been weak in using “soft power” in its effort to support the government attain security and political stability.

Kacyiru-based Niyo Arts Gallery on Friday held the ‘Cultural exchange night’, an event which brought alive African culture through traditional dances and live paintings, exciting those who were in attendance. [...] A young Rwandan passionate about art, whose aim was to support orphaned street children as well as talented but needy children.

“You are the symbols of India’s soft power. You are the unofficial ambassadors, the cultural ambassadors,” Indian President Pranab Mukherjee told expatriates in Windhoek, Namibia, last week. The Southwest African nation has barely 300 expatriates, a miniscule part of a 30 million diaspora spread globally that is being rallied as never before. Mukherjee chose this motley group of businessmen and professionals to propose “a new relationship” with the entire continent of Africa. 

It's a crisis that has spiraled out of control with more than 65 million people now called refugees around the globe. As hundreds of young socially conscious innovators from around the globe meet in the Silicon Valley this week with investors seeking to back their projects at the Global Entrepreneurship Summit (GES), one unique organisation is seeking to tackle the unfolding disaster by reframing the entire way those fleeing their countries because of war or persecution are treated.

The Japanese Ambassador to Ghana, Mr Kaoru Yoshimura, has inaugurated a Japanese language and cultural centre at the Mary Star of the Sea International School at Kasoa in the Central Region. [...] He noted that one important area of Japan’s diplomacy was cultural diplomacy in the form of cultural exchanges, which he said played an important role in bringing understanding and contributing to peace and security in the world.

The state's Turkish International Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA) has launched a rural development program for one of Namibia’s most important ethnic groups, the San people, an official statement said Saturday. The San, also known as the Basarwa or Khwe, have deep roots in Namibia going back some 20,000 years.