Vanuatu and Sri Lanka pledge cooperation on Blue Ocean Charter

Thursday, 11 April 2019 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Shiv Shankaran Nair, Vanuatu’s Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Commonwealth, called upon Foreign Secretary Ravinatha Aryasinha at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs recently.

Nair expressed his government’s desire to strengthen the bilateral relationship between the two island nations who are closely bound by ties of the Commonwealth.

He invited Sri Lankan companies to share their expertise in coconut production, tourism and IT with their counterparts in Vanuatu, and pointed out that certain Sri Lankan companies such as Informatics Ltd., are already active in Vanuatu.

Vanuatu along with the UK are the co-champions under the Blue Ocean Charter in the campaign to eliminate plastic waste in the oceans. Nair invited Sri Lanka to join this group and work closely with the UK and Vanuatu to clean up the Ocean of Plastics.

Sasikala Premawardhana DG Policy Planning and Hasantha Dissanayake DG Ocean Affairs, Environment and Climate Change who also attended the meeting, invited Vanuatu to join the Commonwealth Campaign for Protection of Mangroves, championed by Sri Lanka.

Nair agreed to relay this invitation to his Minister and responded that it was a program that Vanuatu would be joining, as it had similar problems with its own mangroves.

Nair rounded off his trip to Sri Lanka by paying a visit to the residence of Mayantha Dissanayake MP, member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Parliament, to express his condolences on the passing away of Disssanayake’s mother.