University students participate in a protest to denounce President Abdelaziz Bouteflika’s bid for a fifth term, in Algiers, Algeria, Feb. 26, 2019 (AP photo by Anis Belghoul).

Editor’s Note: Every Friday, WPR Senior Editor Robbie Corey-Boulet curates the top news and analysis from and about the African continent. Algeria’s ailing, 81-year-old president, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, announced his candidacy for a fifth term last month in the quietest manner possible, issuing a statement to the state news agency. Given his health problems, which have kept him largely out of the public eye in recent years, analysts speculated that Bouteflika was incapable of launching his re-election bid any other way. The response by Algerians, however, has been anything but quiet. In recent days, they’ve taken to the streets in the […]

Portraits of Saudi King Salman, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan line a highway outside Islamabad ahead of the crown prince's visit to tout Saudi investment in Pakistan, Feb. 17, 2019 (AP photo by Anjum Naveed).

QUETTA, Pakistan—Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman visited Pakistan last week and promptly pledged twice the amount of Saudi investment in infrastructure that observers had expected: $20 billion. Though it may not all be delivered, the promised money signaled the growing Saudi role in major infrastructure development in Pakistan. Until last year, such projects were being funded prominently, and almost exclusively, by China. But last fall, soon after Prime Minister Imran Khan took office, Pakistan unexpectedly invited Saudi Arabia to join the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, or CPEC—the big-ticket Pakistan component of China’s huge Belt and Road Initiative, which was previously only […]

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