NAIROI, Kenya (AP) — France is pitching what it says is a new model of partnership with African countries at a summit that begins Monday in Kenya as it completes a military withdrawal from West African countries that has been widely seen as marking declining influence on the continent.
But Paris is expected to use the two-day Africa Forward Summit, which it is co-hosting, to push a new Africa policy that focuses more on English-speaking countries and offers what it calls a “partnership of equals." Its new defense agreement with Kenya marks the direction it hopes to go.
France has long maintained a policy of economic, political and military sway over its former colonies dubbed Françafrique, which included keeping thousands of troops in the region. But after years of criticism from leaders and opposition parties in those countries over what they described as a demeaning and heavy-handed approach, France has been forced to withdraw most of those troops.
The summit — France's first in an English-speaking African country — will be attended by more than 30 heads of state and government, including from Francophone countries. On his arrival Sunday, French President Emmanuel Macron said France may disagree with West African governments but “never disagrees with the people.”
Kenya’s newly ratified defense agreement with France has been criticized by civil society groups for granting too much immunity local law to French troops, a sensitive issue in a country where a similar agreement with the United Kingdom has left a trail of hard-to-prosecute crimes against locals.
At a time when many African nations, particularly in the Sahel region, are reducing or expelling foreign military presences in what they say is a quest to reclaim their sovereignty, Kenya is hosting a growing international military presence.
The Kenya-France Defense Cooperation Agreement was signed on Oct. 29, 2025, by Kenya’s Defense Minister Soipan Tuya and French Ambassador to Kenya Arnaud Suquet and ratified by parliament on April 8. The same month, it also ratified defense agreements with countries including the Czech Republic, China and Italy.
While defending the defense agreements, parliament defense committee chair Nelson Koech said Kenya's treaties with advanced militaries provide training and intelligence-sharing opportunities that will make its defense stronger.
Koech said the agreements were not a “surrender of sovereignty,” adding that newer agreements guarantee that foreign troops will be tried in Kenya in the event of serious crimes such as murder.
A month ahead of the summit, a contingent of around 800 French troops arrived in Kenya aboard a navy ship.
The agreement grants visiting French forces primary jurisdiction over their personnel for on-duty offenses, echoing broad legal protections in past UK pacts that shielded British soldiers from Kenyan courts amid scandals like the 2012 murder of a young woman named Agnes Wanjiru and the deadly 2021 Lolldaiga ranch fire.
A British soldier is due to be extradited after Kenyan courts found him answerable for the 2012 death of Wanjiru, who was last seen alive in his company near the British troops’ training grounds in Nanyuki, central Kenya.
French President Emmanuel Macron, left, and Kenyan President William Ruto stand during the national anthems at State House in Nairobi, Kenya, Sunday, May 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga)
French President Emmanuel Macron, left, and Kenyan President William Ruto shake hands at State House in Nairobi, Kenya, Sunday, May 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Brian Inganga)
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — A French woman and two Americans tested positive or showed symptoms of hantavirus Monday as nations around the world scrambled to repatriate passengers from a cruise ship hit by an outbreak and quarantine or isolate them.
Passengers from the ship began flying home aboard military and government planes Sunday after the vessel anchored in the Canary Islands. Personnel in full-body protective gear and breathing masks had escorted the travelers from ship to shore in Tenerife in an effort that was continuing Monday.
The French woman tested positive for hantavirus and her health worsened in the hospital overnight, French Health Minister Stephanie Rist said Monday. The woman was among five French passengers repatriated Sunday to Paris from the MV Hondius. She developed symptoms on the flight to Paris, Rist told public broadcaster France-Inter.
One the 17 American passengers evacuated from the ship and flown to Nebraska also tested positive for the hantavirus but is not showing any symptoms, and another had mild symptoms, U.S. health officials said late Sunday. The flight landed in the early hours of Monday morning and stopped near awaiting buses and police vehicles.
The Americans would first be taken to the University of Nebraska Medical Center, which has a federally funded quarantine facility, to assess whether they have been in close contact with any symptomatic people and their risk levels for spreading the virus.
“One passenger will be transported to the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit upon arrival, while other passengers will go to the National Quarantine Unit for assessment and monitoring. The passenger who is going to the Biocontainment Unit tested positive for the virus but does not have symptoms,” said Kayla Thomas, a spokesperson for the Nebraska Medicine hospital that will help care for the passengers.
The medical school also has a special unit for treating people with highly infectious diseases that was used early in the pandemic for COVID-19 patients and previously for Ebola patients.
The World Health Organization recommended close monitoring of the former passengers, and many countries quarantined them.
Earlier, officials from the Spanish Health Ministry, the World Health Organization and the cruise company Oceanwide Expeditions had said none of the more than 140 people who were then on the Hondius had shown symptoms of the virus.
All of the passengers were escorted Sunday from the ship to shore by personnel in full-body protective gear and breathing masks. The planes arriving in Tenerife were to fly out passengers from more than 20 countries in an evacuation effort that was running into Monday.
Three people have died since the outbreak began, and five people who left the ship earlier were infected.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has stressed that the general public should not be worried about the outbreak. “This is not another COVID. And the risk to the public is low. So they shouldn’t be scared, and they shouldn’t panic," he said Sunday.
Hantavirus usually spreads from rodent droppings and is not easily transmitted between people. But the Andes virus detected in the cruise ship outbreak may be able to spread between people in rare cases. Symptoms usually show between one and eight weeks after exposure.
WHO is recommending that passengers’ home countries “have active monitoring and follow-up, which means daily health checks, either at home or in a specialized facility,” said Maria van Kerkhove, the organization’s top epidemiologist.
Numerous countries have said their people will be quarantined or hospitalized for observation.
Australia is sending a plane, expected to arrive Monday, to evacuate its people and those from nearby countries, such as New Zealand, and unspecified Asian countries, said Spanish Health Minister Mónica García, who added that the evacuation flight was expected to be the last to leave Tenerife.
Dutch Foreign Minister Tom Berendsen said a second Dutch flight Monday would bring back more passengers from the Netherlands and other nations.
Berendsen said the evacuation operation "is based on concern for the passengers. But also concern for public health, and we try to do that in the best way.”
Nebraska Medicine's Davis Global Center is seen on Sunday, May 10,2026 in Omaha, Neb. where American passengers from the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship will quarantine. (AP Photo/Rebecca S. Gratz)
Passengers leave a plane at Manchester Airport, after being repatriated to the United Kingdom from the MV Hondius cruise ship, which was hit by hantavirus, Sunday, May 10, 2026, in Manchester, England. (Peter Byrne/PA via AP)
Passengers are sprayed with disinfectant by Spanish government officials before boarding a plane after disembarking from the hantavirus-stricken cruise ship MV Hondius at Tenerife airport in the Canary Islands, Spain, Sunday, May 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Arturo Rodriguez)
Ambulances carrying patients evacuated from the MV Hondius cruise ship with suspected hantavirus infection, leave the Bourget airport, north of Paris, Sunday, May 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)
A plane carrying patients evacuated from the MV Hondius cruise ship with suspected hantavirus infection, lands at the Bourget airport, north of Paris, Sunday, May 10, 2026. (AP Photo/Thibault Camus)
