The Conference of Independent African States convened in Accra in April 1958 at the initiative of Kwame Nkrumah. Heads of state or foreign ministers represented Libya, Ethiopia, Sudan, Tunisia, Morocco, Egypt and Liberia, alongside the host country Ghana. The composition gave the meeting a distinctly governmental and continental character.

The conference produced a broad but vague consensus on foreign policy. African states should remain non-aligned in the rival power blocs of the world and should maintain solidarity with one another. Although the agreement did not resolve the deeper political questions surrounding African unity, it generated sufficient momentum for further institutional efforts.

The meeting began the process that culminated in the Organisation of African Unity in 1963. It also created a sense that independent African countries could meet collectively to discuss the major questions facing Africa and the wider world, even though its programme fell short of the more radical commitments associated with the All-African Peoples’ Conference later that year.