Rt Hon Winston Peters
Minister of Foreign Affairs

07 December 2005
Media Release

Peters to attend East Asia Summit Foreign Ministers meeting in Kuala Lumpur

Foreign Minister Winston Peters leaves New Zealand mid-afternoon on Thursday 08 December to take part in the Foreign Ministers meeting preceding the inaugural East Asia Summit (EAS) in Kuala Lumpur.

He will attend a Foreign Ministers meeting and lunch on Saturday, and will have bilateral meetings with a number of his Asian counterparts on Friday and Saturday morning.

“The main focus of the Foreign Ministers meeting will be to finalise the draft of the first EAS declaration to be signed by EAS Leaders (including Prime Minister Helen Clark) at their Summit meeting next week.

“Foreign Ministers will also prepare the ground for consideration by Leaders of political and economic issues of concern to countries in the region. New Zealand is pleased to be participating in the first ever East Asia Summit, and we take our role in it seriously,” Mr Peters said.

The Foreign Ministers meeting involves Foreign Ministers from the ten Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) countries as well as Australia, China, India, Japan, Korea and New Zealand.

ASEAN was established in 1967 by Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. Brunei Darussalam joined in the mid-1980s and Viet Nam, Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia during the 1990s.

Mr Peters will return to New Zealand on Sunday 11 December. He will attend a mid-day meeting that day with the people of Ngati Wai at Whangarei.

ENDS

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