European leaders flocked to Angola this week to strike deals and deepen cooperation with their African counterparts, as global tensions mount.
"Africa and Europe are partners of choice, bound by common interests and priorities and shared values," EU Council President António Costa posted on social media before the EU-African Union (AU) Summit kicked off on Monday.
"In a turbulent world, our commitment to build a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable future - and to defend multilateralism - must guide our actions," he wrote.
Of course, Africa and Europe were not always partners of choice.
For much of modern history, European nations conquered and plundered the continent, seizing its abundant natural resources for their own enrichment.
As delegates gathered in the capital, Luanda, the country had just celebrated 50 years since gaining independence from Portugal.
For the previous 400 years, Portugal had ruled over the oil and diamond-rich nation, which by the 19th Century, was the largest source of slaves for the Americas.
A brutal 40-year civil war followed independence and today, Angola remains one of the most heavily mined countries in the world. Landmine victims can be seen on the streets of the capital.
Despite the country’s enormous wealth, little of it appears to trickle down.
"We earn less than a hundred US dollars a month," one Luanda tour operator told RTÉ News.
Asked can you live on that here, he answered: "We don’t live, we survive".
He was hopeful about the Europeans being in town.
"There needs to be more investment here," he said, "instead of the money going overseas".
Today, Africa’s natural resources are once again very much in demand.
The continent is home to more than half of the world’s cobalt reserves - essential for rechargeable batteries, wind turbines and even some nuclear weapons.
There are also vast reserves of copper, lithium and manganese.
And then there are Africa's human resources.
As populations in Europe and Asia tip into decline, Africa’s is set to grow. It will be home to a quarter of the world’s people in 2050 and top four billion by century’s end.
"I think the potential, if you look two to three decades ahead, is Africa," Taoiseach Micheál Martin said as the AU-EU Summit began, "in terms of population growth, in terms of the importance of what will be a significant economic market in time".
The European Union is still the biggest market for African countries, he said.
"So, it is very important to have a structured, sustainable, respectful and mutually beneficial relationship with Africa," he added.
Europe, still reeling from the US trade tariffs and China’s export control on critical minerals, wants to shore up its supply chain resilience.
"I believe there has been less progress than the EU hoped for," Adrian Joseph from the South African Institute of International Affairs said.
While European and African nations have struck deals on critical minerals - the most recent on the sidelines of the G20 Summit in Johannesburg last week - the roadmaps that accompany them are not publicly available, he said.
"This makes is difficult to assess progress," he said, adding "a lack of transparency around these agreements is naturally not only an implementation problem, but also an accountability issue".
For Africa, there remains a risk of exploitation, Mr Joseph said.
"In the absence of any serious reforms, there is a real risk that the extraction of the critical minerals needed to power the energy transition could occur at the expense of citizens and the environment in African countries," he added.
However, African leaders were clear in their demands. In return for supplying Europe with critical minerals, they want the EU to open up its market.
In his address to the summit, Chairperson of the AU Commission Mahmoud Ali Youssouf said: "We are calling for more balanced trade partnerships.
"I’m pleading for European investments in the transformation process of our minerals on the continent.
"I’m calling for the lifting of any tariff hampering the access of African products to the European market."
Of course, in eyeing up Africa’s natural wealth, Europe is not alone.
"There are other interests involved in Africa," Mr Martin told reporters, "including Russia and China".
Indeed, China has been investing heavily in the continent for decades. More than 50 African countries signed up to China's leader Xi Jinping’s flagship Belt and Road infrastructure development project.
Luanda’s gleaming new international airport, for example, is Chinese-built.
Now with so much interest flowing from wealthy nations, African governments could be in a position to choose the best deals, analysts said.
"It is about which partners can provide the best value proposition to African countries seeking investments in their mining sectors, as these countries are not eager to become entangled in the geopolitical tensions between the US and China," Mr Joseph said.
