Zambia’s Government has said that it has opposed to an attempt by the United States to link funding for health to critical mineral access and concerns about data sharing. Business Day reports that Zambia’s Foreign Minister, Mulambo Haimbe, said the US had offered support of up to $2bn over the next five years in a proposed health agreement, but that some of the terms regarding data sharing would violate Zambians’ right to privacy. Separately, he said Zambia had objections to the content of a proposed critical minerals agreement. ‘A further concern… is the coupling of the proposed agreements and frameworks to one another such that the conclusion of the critical minerals agreement is made conditional on the conclusion of the health MOU (memorandums of understanding),’ Haimbe said in a statement. ‘The Zambian Government has been consistent that the agreements must be considered separately on their respective merits,’ he added. He said that Zambia was reluctant to accept the terms due to an insistence on preferential treatment for US companies. The US state department has said that it does not disclose details of bilateral negotiations.
