Reem Al Hashemy confers with foreign ministers

NEW YORK: Reem Bint Ibrahim Al Hashemy, Minister of State for International Cooperation, has continued holding meetings with a number of foreign ministers on the sidelines of the 73rd session of the UN General Assembly in New York.

Al Hashemy met with Sigrid Kaag, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation of Netherlands; Alpha Barry, Burkina Faso’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and Marcel Amon-tanoh, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Cote d’ivoire. They discussed ways to bolster the existing ties particularly in the economic and trade sectors. The parties also exchanged views on a number of regional and global issues and the latest developments as well as issues of mutual interest.

The UAE minister took part in a panel discussion organised by the Women Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative (We-fi). The panel was moderated by Jim Yong Kim, President of the World Bank and was attended by Queen Maxima of the Netherlands and Ivanka Trump, adviser of US President Donald Trump.

Al Hashemy delivered the welcoming note of the UAE as one of the contributors and establishing countries of the initiative.

We-fi is a collaborative partnership among 14 governments, eight multilateral development banks (MDBS), and other public and private sector stakeholders, hosted by the World Bank Group. It seeks to address inancial and non-inancial constraints faced by women-owned/led small and medium enterprises in developing countries.

The founding inancial contributors are: Australia, Canada, China, Denmark, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, the Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Republic of Korea, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom and the United States. These 14 governments have committed over $340 million to launch the facility’s activities.