Ruto arrived in the U.S. this week on a four-day state visit that includes talks with Biden on Thursday followed by a lavish state dinner in the evening.
The trip by the East African nation’s leader marked the sixth state visit hosted by the Biden administration, and the first for an African president since 2008.
A senior U.S. administration official who spoke to Reuters said Biden and Ruto will announce a plan to reduce Kenya’s debt burden on Thursday.
Biden will designate Kenya as a major non-NATO ally, making it the first sub-Saharan African country to receive the designation, the official added.
Currently, 18 countries are designated as non-NATO allies, including Israel, Brazil and the Philippines.
The U.S. will announce $250 million in new investments in Kenya through the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation, including $180 million for a major affordable housing project, a U.S. official said. That will bring Washington’s financing portfolio in Kenya to over $1 billion.
U.S. infrastructure investment manager Everstrong Capital on Thursday said it has signed an agreement with Kenya’s highways authority. The deal is focused on building a 440-kilometer highway between the nation’s capital Nairobi to the port city of Mombasa.
"The project anticipates attracting investments totaling $3.6 billion, sourced from international investors, development agencies, pension funds and an exceptionally large number of Kenyan private investors," Everstrong said in its statement.
Ruto and Biden also will discuss the humanitarian crisis in Haiti amid preparations to deploy 1,000 Kenyan police officers to the Caribbean country as part of United Nations-backed effort to curb gang violence and hunger, U.S. officials say.
Jake Sullivan, Biden's national security advisor, said Ruto’s state visit highlights the "important role in global peace and security" filled by Kenya, which has worked with the United States in hotspots such as Somalia and now Haiti.
The national security advisor also saluted Ruto as a "leading voice" on reducing the mounting debts of developing countries.
"We are demonstrating how, as President Biden has said himself, the United States is all in on Africa, and all in with Africa," Sullivan told reporters on Wednesday.
But Biden, after holding a major summit for African leaders in late 2022, has not made good on promises to visit the continent as president
Ruto is scheduled to be celebrated at a dinner lit by 1,000 candles and a menu of heirloom tomato soup, butter-poached lobster, smoked beef short ribs and a white chocolate dessert.
Country singer Brad Paisley will headline the dinner along with the Howard University Gospel Choir, both of which are tributes to Kenyan leader’s musical interests.
Source information for this article was sourced from Reuters and Agence France-Presse.
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