Chairman of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina Dragan Čović received today credentials of the newly appointed non-residing Ambassador of New Zealand to BiH with headquarters in Rome, Patrick John Rata.
Bilateral relations between BiH and New Zealand are friendly and without open issues, followed by bilateral visits of highest levels, such as the visit by the Prime Minister of New Zealand John Key to BiH a year ago, it was stated at the beginning of the ceremony of the presentation of credentials.
Although New Zealand is not a full member of Euro-Atlantic organizations, what has a strategic importance for BiH is the cooperation with New Zealand in certain aspects of Euro-Atlantic integration. In this regard, Čović informed Rata about current priority activities of BiH in terms of foreign policy and possible difficulties on that path.
Rata said that New Zealand strongly supports BiH on its Euro-Atlantic path and congratulated Čović for the submission of application for membership in the EU, expressing the hope that further NATO integration of BiH will also start soon, after the expected activation of the Membership Action Plan at the NATO Summit in Warsaw in July this year.
Čović and Rata believe that there are great possibilities of improvement of overall relations and cooperation and that additional efforts must be put in making relations in the field of economic cooperation and creation of partnerships more dynamic.
(Source: novovrijeme.ba)
