The domain of foreign aid assistance has experienced a new surge and dynamism in recent years that is particularly visible in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The MENA region is among the largest recipients of foreign aid worldwide with a variety of protracted development deficits. The region is of major strategic importance on many levels, due to its geopolitical relevance and friction, wealth of natural resources as well as central location at the crossroads of global trade.
It is to no surprise that the European Union and its Member States continue to remain the largest foreign aid donor for its direct neighborhood in the south. The U.S. has been in the process of reevaluating and reshuffling its priorities and resources in its foreign aid assistance towards the MENA. New actors have been entering the stage of development cooperation with immense financial means and new understandings of foreign aid assistance, most notably the Gulf Arab States. China, on the other side, has introduced with its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) a new type of “development” project. With this plethora of stakes involved, it is no secret that foreign aid comes with political strings and strategic goals attached.

Against this background, this conference organized by the Regional Program Political Dialogue South Mediterranean of the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung (KAS) and the Mediterranean Academy for Diplomatic Studies (MEDAC) aims to map the new trends, patterns and priorities of foreign aid assistance as well as their objectives and impacts for the regional development of the MENA.