Africa: Is there anybody there!

"Ceuta and Melilla have however communicated the unequivocal message that in addition to Kananaskis, Gleneagles and Washington, Europe and the developed world rely for their welfare and the defence of their self-interest on yet another response to the appeals of the poor of Africa and the world. That response is made up of the fortress walls in Ceuta and Melilla that are being further strengthened to repel and exclude the poor of the South, the majority of humanity, from the Northern world of the European nations, which are part of the global prosperous minority. These are the countries of the North which have the wherewithal, but lack sufficient will, to end the poverty that drives thousands of Africans to walk from as far south as the Democratic Republic of Congo, across many African countries and the Sahara Desert, to reach Fortress Europe, symbolised by Ceuta and Melilla. Because the prosperous of Europe refuse, still, properly to listen to the poor of Africa, the wretched of the earth died and were injured as they battled to breach the walls of Fortress Europe at Ceuta and Melilla." - Thabo Mbeki, South African president, writing in his weekly column ANC Today.