Top level EU commissioner to visit NZ

Top level EU commissioner to visit NZ

Benita Ferrero-Waldner, the European Union Commissioner for External Relations, will present this year’s Europa Lecture in Wellington on 27 June.

The lecture is hosted by the New Zealand European Union Centres Network, which is administered from the National Centre for Research on Europe (NCRE) based at the University of Canterbury, and the European Commission Delegation to New Zealand.

The role of the commissioner is to foster cooperation and promote dialogue with countries outside the union. Her busy schedule has seen her lead official missions in 2007 to Yemen, Guatemala, Colombia, Liechtenstein, Switzerland, the Middle East, India and China. In April she travelled to the United Nations in New York to meet UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon.

NCRE Director Professor Martin Holland said Commissioner Ferrero-Waldner’s visit underlined the increasingly positive nature of the EU-New Zealand relationship and the EU's global collaborations.

While in New Zealand Commissioner Ferrero-Waldner will hold talks with Prime Minister Helen Clark and Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters.

Now in its seventh year, the Europa Lecture is presented by a high profile, leading New Zealand or European politician. Previous speakers have included Ms Clark, the then Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Phil Goff, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Chair of the European Parliament Budget Committee Terry Wynn, and European Commissioners Chris Patten and Marianne Fischer Boel.

The Europa Lecture will be held at Te Papa on Wednesday 27 June beginning at 5.15pm

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