United Arab Emirates Pacific Islands Partnership Consolidated

Realfijinews - Saturday, 10 April 2010

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  New York, H.E. Ambassador Ahmed Rahman Al Jarman, the Permanent Representative of the United Arab Emirates to the United Nations, held a meeting with his counterparts for the Pacific countries at the UN to follow up results of an official visit made by Foreign Minister HH Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan to the Pacific Region in February including the Pacific Islands Partnership Program.

   

  The groundbreaking meeting, which took place at the UAE Mission, was attended by representatives from Samoa, Solomon Islands, Palau, Nauru, Vanuatu, Tonga, Tuvalu, Fiji, Micronesia, and Marshall Islands.

   

  Al Jarman briefed the attendees about the strategy of the Pacific Islands Partnership Program launched by the UAE to build and strengthen its relations with the island nations of the Pacific while assisting individual countries in their efforts toaddress a wide range of environmental, economic and developmental issues they are facing.

   

  He also updated the representatives of the Pacific countries about efforts made by the UAE deliver objectives of the Partnership in assisting these countries to undertake developmental projects in areas of education, social services, healthcare, renewable energy and climate change mitigation programs.

   

  The UAE is keen to support the islands nations of the Pacific in addressing these challenges. To do so, the UAE will seek to leverage not only its foreign aid program but also its deep and growing expertise in low carbon technologies.

   

  Launched during the first visit of Sheikh Abdullah to the Pacific Region in last February, the Partnership in the Pacific Program has been designed to facilitate meaningful cooperation between the United Arab Emirates and Pacific island nations on programs and initiatives within a mutually developed co-operative framework. To that end the UAE has created a new starting program of $50 million to be awarded to specific projects and partnerships in the Pacific in critical developmental areas such as education, social and healthcare services and infrastructure.

   

  The UAE Permanent Representative said the four key elements of the "Partnership in the Pacific Program" include: Financial Assistance, Facilitating Dialogue, Developing Research/Academic Partnerships and Developing Tools in Partnership with theRegion and Capacity Building Programs.

   

  The delegates of the Pacific islands expressed gratitude of their countries to the Government of the UAE for its initiative which they praised the first of its kind at the international level. They affirmed that the Partnership provides a firm, clear and practical proof of the UAE's commitment to assist developing countries to build national capacities to addressescalating economic, humanitarian and climatic challenges.

   

  The UAE diplomat welcomed holding of collective or bilateral meetings to coordinate efforts for putting the partnership's objectives in place within the framework of the UN development agenda.

   

  The "Partnership in the Pacific Program" is consistent with the UAE s long-standing record of international cooperation and its rapidly expanding capabilities in the field of low carbon technologies as well as its diverse foreign aid program. It is also in line with the UAE s wish to strengthen and expand its relationships with the island nations of the Pacific and build on the already strong ties that characterize our growing bilateral relationships there.

   

  The "Partnership in the Pacific Program" is an outreach umbrella program initiated by the UAE to strengthen and increase co-operation with the island states of the Pacific in a number of key development areas.

   

  The "Partnership in the Pacific Program" aims to facilitate cooperation and to assist individual countries from the region in their own efforts to address social, economic and environmental as well as other developmental issues. In the area ofclimate change specifically, the program also seeks to establish a new model for country-to-country and country-to-region cooperation to address the domestic and cross-border impacts of one of the most truly global challenges the world has ever faced.

   

  With a growing interest in the field of low carbon technologies the UAE believes it is in an ideal position to contribute to international efforts and regional partnerships to address the social, environmental and economic impacts of climate change, at home and around the world as well as to build ties with island states in a number of other developmental areas.