Minister Johnson Smith to Attend Brussels ACP-EU Meetings & London Diaspora Consultations

Senator the Honourable Kamina Johnson Smith, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, leaves the island today for Brussels, Belgium, where she will lead Jamaica’s delegation to three meetings related to ACP-EU relations.

Her programme begins with the 104^th Session of the Council of Ministers of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group from 28th to 30^th November. A major focus of the Council of Ministers will be the future of the ACP and the ACP-EU relations, when the Cotonou Partnership Agreement expires in 2020. The implications of Brexit, the budget and other administrative operations for the Secretariat will also be on the agenda.

Minister Johnson Smith will also participate in the 19^th ACP Ministerial Trade Committee (MTC) and the 14^th Joint ACP-EU Ministerial Trade Committee meetings on 7^th and 8^th December respectively. Both Ministerial Committees will deliberate on a wide range of trade related issues.

In her capacity as High Representative, the Minister will update all three on matters relating to CARIFORUM.

During the hiatus between the meetings in Brussels, the Minister will travel to London from 1^st to 4^th December, where she will address attendees in a Diaspora Stakeholder’s briefing. She will also meet with key United Kingdom officials on matters of bilateral and regional interest, including relations in the post Brexit era.

As the Minister prepared for her consultations overseas, she  shared her principal goal of presenting “Jamaica’s priorities, whether in building trade capacity, or in Diaspora engagement and representing Jamaica at the highest level, as many other Jamaican women in economics, politics and the society in general have done throughout the decades.”