As the leaders of the richest nations carry on their annual conference despite the bombings in London, they have a chance to embrace what should be an essential element of any long-term global strategy against terrorism. By adopting a plan to tackle the extreme poverty of Africa, the leaders of the G-8 countries will also take on the civil wars, governmental breakdowns and illicit financial flows in Africa. The need to deliberate the problems in Africa aside, there are security reasons, too, starting with the way Africa straddles the increasingly fraught divide between Islamic and Christian civilisations. That schism has found expression in some of the continent’s longest-running conflicts. Failed states have lost chunks of territory to warlords, and that can no longer track or control their borders send an invitation to terrorists. And with Africa on track to be the source for 25 per cent of this country’s crude oil imports by 2015, Washington has a special interest in promoting the continent’s peaceful development and avoiding the nexus between oil money and terrorism that has developed in the Middle East. That concern underscores the importance of the other main issue on the meeting’s agenda: global climate change and the need to find alternatives to polluting fossil fuels. — The New York Times