Rt Hon Winston Peters
Minister of Foreign Affairs

New Zealand and Argentina have agreed to cooperate more closely, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says.

“Our discussions today have underlined that both New Zealand and Argentina are working hard to make our economies more efficient in order to deliver more jobs and higher living standards through export growth,” Mr Peters, who met President Javier Milei and Foreign Minister Pablo Quirno, says.

“Argentina has achieved an impressive economic turnaround and government reform in recent years, and New Zealand companies can and should be among those to do more here.”

Mr Peters is currently leading a Parliamentary and business delegation through Latin America. The Parliamentary delegation visited Argentina’s National Congress, and called on its New Zealand Parliamentary Friendship Group.

This is the first visit to Argentina by a New Zealand Foreign Minister since Mr Peters last came in 2007.

His discussions with President Milei and Foreign Minister Quirno also involved dialogue on the uncertain international environment and recent global developments.

“We spoke about a range of issues of mutual interest, including the situation in Iran, the competitive strategic environment in both the Western Hemisphere and the Indo-Pacific, and the urgent need for reform of the UN system,” Mr Peters says.

“Overall, today’s discussions demonstrated our growing business, education and people-to-people links with Argentina, while stressing our joint commitment to open, rules-based trade.”

Mr Peters and the Parliamentary and business delegations leave for Uruguay tomorrow, before programmes later in the week in Brazil, Chile (Santiago and Rapa Nui) and French Polynesia.

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