The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Colombo announced that the 25th Meeting of the Joint Commission between Sri Lanka and the European Union will be held on May 9, 2023.
Aruni Wijewardane, secretary of Sri Lanka’s foreign ministry, and Paola Pampaloni, deputy managing director of the EU’s European External Action Service for Asia and the Pacific, will co-chair the meeting.
According to the foreign affairs ministry, the Joint Commission will consider a wide variety of bilateral and multilateral topics of mutual importance to both sides and propose potential areas for future cooperation.
The meeting will also include a detailed discussion of the findings of the three Working Groups established by the Joint Commission: the Working Group on Governance, Rule of Law and Human Rights; the Working Group on Trade and Economic Cooperation; and the Working Group on Development Cooperation.
The new cycle of the EU GSP Regulation, which is set to be accepted for 2024–2033, will go into effect on January 1, 2024, and last for the following 10 years, according to the statement from the European Union delegation.
In addition to senior members of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Sri Lanka delegation will include representatives from the Ministries of Finance, Economic Stabilization and National Policies, Justice, Prison Affairs and Constitutional Reforms, Trade, Commerce and Food Security, Labour and Foreign Employment, Education, Environment, Defence, Fisheries, Public Security, Urban Development and Housing, and the Attorney General’s Department.
According to the government, the Joint Commission meeting’s previous session took place in Brussels in February 2022.
