Climate, malaria highlighted as Commonwealth leaders meet

KIGALI, Rwanda (AP) — Leaders of Commonwealth nations are meeting in Rwanda Friday in a summit that promises to tackle climate change, tropical diseases and other challenges deepened by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The summit for Commonwealth heads of state in Kigali, the Rwandan capital, is the culmination of a series of meetings earlier in the week that have reported some success in efforts to improve the lives of people in the 54-nation bloc that is home to 2.5 billion people.

Those numbers are set to rise with the expected admission into the Commonwealth of the African nations of Togo and Gabon, which have asked to join the bloc despite having no colonial history with Britain. The Commonwealth comprises mostly former British colonies, but countries such as Mozambique and Rwanda — a former Belgian colony with an Anglophile leader — have in the past launched successful bids to join the group whose titular head is Queen Elizabeth II.

Rwanda's hosting the summit is contentious to some who cite the East African country's poor human rights record under Paul Kagame, an authoritarian leader who has been de facto leader or president since the 1994 genocide. Other critics are unhappy with what they see as an illegal and cruel deal with Britain to transfer migrants thousands of miles to Rwanda. That agreement faces legal hurdles, and the first group of migrants is yet to arrive in Rwanda.

World leaders attending the summit in Kigali range from Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whose leadership of the Conservative party suffered a heavy blow overnight as voters rejected the party's candidates in two special elections, is also in Rwanda.

Prince Charles is representing his mother, who at 96 is...