Africans have not forgotten colonial past, iconic Egyptian leader's grandson reminds EU top diplomat

Moscow: Days after the EU's top diplomat Josep Borell admitted there is a high level of support for Russia and its President Vladimir Putin among African nations and people, Egyptian activist and African Legacy Forum founding member Gamal Abdel Nasser contended that the European powers fail to acknowledge their colonial legacy in present dealings with various nations of the continent.

Nasser, who is named after his illustrious grandfather and Egyptian President, who overthrew the country's monarchy and faced off with then-colonial powers, recalled how the USSR had helped liberation movements in various African nations.

"We have a good working past with Russia. Of course, it had its ups and downs, but we have a much worse past with the colonising nations of Europe," Nasser said in an interview to RT.

Noting European countries had long been carrying out political and military interference in Africa, he said that Africans do not have a "memory loss", and are aware of what happened in the past centuries.

"If they want to work with us - OK, but we need them not to forget this past," Nasser added.

"We work with the countries that are willing to work with us on a fair basis and we do not want to be dictated on how we should govern ourselves, what our fiscal policy should be, or who we should talk to, and who we should support and who we should not support. This is still the mentality of the past. It’s the neo-colonisation. If they are thinking it’s either Russia or the West, then they are still thinking with this mentality," he told RT.

His reaction came as EU top diplomat Josep Borrell, speaking at the NATO Public Forum in Washington as part of NATO's 75th anniversary summit, on Thursday expressed surprise about the level of support African people are showing towards Russia, and called for a new approach focused on information warfare to influence perceptions.

His remarks came amid closer ties between Russia and various African nations in several fields, including security. Some West African nations have ended their counter-terrorism agreements with Western nations and turned to Russia for assistance.

In 2023, delegations from 48 African countries took part in the Russia-Africa summit in St. Petersburg. At the event, the Kremlin declared that almost all had been subjected to "unprecedented" pressure from the West, which tried to prevent their participation.