Foreign relations of the Gambia Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), the Gambia has played an active role in that organization's efforts to resolve the Liberian Civil War and contributed troops to the community's cease-fire monitoring group (ECOMOG). It also has sought to mediate disputes in nearby Guinea-Bissau and the neighbouring Casamance region of Senegal. The People's Republic of China, Cuba, Libya, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America have embassies or high commissions in the Gambia. On 25 May 2005, the Gambia announced its readiness to establish full diplomatic relations with the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.
West African Pidgin English its role as a creole native language spoken in and around the coastal slave castles and slave trading centers by people permanently based there. West African Pidgin English arose during the period when the British dominated the Atlantic slave trade in the late 17th and 18th centuries, ultimately exporting more slaves to the Americas than all the other European nations combined. During this period, English-speaking sailors and slave traders were in constant contact with native African peoples and long-distance traders along thousands of miles of West African coastline. Africans who picked up elements of pidgin English for purposes of trade