February 3, 2016
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Senior Officials Meeting of the Conference on Cooperation among East Asian
Countries for Palestinian Development (CEAPAD)
1 The Ministry of Foreign Affairs hosted the Senior Officials Meeting of the Conference on Cooperation among East Asian Countries for Palestinian Development (CEAPAD) in Hakone on February 2 and 3, 2016.
2 Japan co-chaired the meeting with Palestine, and participants included Asian countries and international institutions. Mr. Masaharu Kohno, Representative of the Government of Japan and Special Envoy for the Middle East peace, attended from Japan, and Mr. Shukri Bishara, Minister of Finance and Minister of Planning and Administrative Development, attended from Palestine.
3 The summary of the meeting is as follows.
(1) In the opening remarks, Special Envoy Kohno commented on the importance of the meeting and introduced contributions from Japan. Minister Bishara explained the current state and the outlook of the Palestinian economy.
(2) During the first session, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), the Islamic Development Bank (IDB) and Indonesia provided reports on progress after the Second Ministerial Meeting of CEAPAD. In the second session, South Korea and Singapore shared challenges related to the implementation of assistance on the ground, and participants discussed ways to overcome them. In the third session, Thailand and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) delivered comments on promoting cooperation among CEAPAD participants and the role of development agencies.
(3) In particular, reports were given on the implementation of projects using the CEAPAD Facilitation Mechanism (a mechanism for assisting human resource development managed by the IDB, JICA, and Palestine) established at the Second Ministerial Meeting of CEAPAD and participants reviewed ways to achieve active utilization of the mechanism. Participants confirmed that they would accomplish concrete outcomes by the next Ministerial Meeting of CEAPAD and contributed to sustaining and boosting the momentum of assistance.
* The foregoing is a provisional translation. The date indicated above denotes the date of issue of the original press release in Japanese.
* For inquiries, please contact the First Middle East Division, Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Tel. 5501-8000 (Ext. 2764).
Country: Japan
Subject: Assistance, Economic issues
Publication Date: 03/02/2016