The African Union's concept of a Sixth Region refers to the global African diaspora; the tens of millions of people of African descent living outside the continent, including in the Caribbean, the Americas, Europe, and beyond. The designation, rooted in an AU Executive Council decision from 2008 and formalised through subsequent resolutions, provides diaspora communities with observer status at AU summits and a formal channel for engagement with continental institutions.
Caribbean nations have increasingly leveraged this framework to build economic and political ties with Africa. Several CARICOM member states, including Barbados, the Bahamas, and Guyana, have joined Afreximbank. The Africa-Caribbean Business Council, established through a memorandum of understanding between the CARICOM Private Sector Organisation and Afreximbank, is one concrete institutional product of that relationship. The Sixth Region framework is a diaspora-wide designation; the Caribbean is a participant in it, not a region formally named within the African Union's geographic structure.
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