President Alberto Fernández met this Tuesday with the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Japan, Yoshimasa Hayashi, and pointed out the intention to move forward to convert the bilateral strategic relationship “into a global strategic partnership.
The meeting was held at Government House within the framework of 125 years of “close diplomatic relations with Japan,” according to the national president.
“We are taking a further step in the diplomatic relationship: it means the possibility of expanding bilateral trade, of US$ 1,862 million in 2021, strengthening the bilateral agenda on trade, economic and financial issues and greater coordination in multilateral organizations,” Fernández wrote in your Twitter account.
We are taking a further step in the diplomatic relationship: it means the possibility of expanding bilateral trade, of US$ 1,862 million in 2021, strengthening the bilateral agenda on trade, economic and financial issues and greater coordination in multilateral organizations ✅ pic.twitter.com/286OyMCQnr
– Alberto Fernandez (@alferdez) January 10, 2023
Previously, The Government had announced that it is studying the possibility of converting the relationship it has with the Asian nation to transform it into a “strategic partnership”.
This was announced by Foreign Minister Santiago Cafiero himself, who in a statement he offered to the press after the meeting in the presidential office, stated that the initiative “is to convert the strategic relationship into a global strategic association.”
“It is one more step, in some way, in the diplomatic relationship and it is something that we are committed to today with the Japanese foreign minister to explore and to be able to move forward,” said the head of the San Martín Palace.
Cafiero commented that the Asian country has “a community of 65,000 people who have integrated into Argentine culture and have enriched it.”
In this regard, Cafiero, who was also at the meeting, said that in the “conversation with the President, the foreign minister highlighted this close link between Japan and Argentina.”
“This will bring possibilities of greater investment and greater ties, above all coordination in multilateral organizations, part of what is the global agenda that this world of uncertainty is throwing up and where with Japan we are united by different perspectives, fundamentally of coordination with respect to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons”.
LIVE | Minister’s statements @SantiagoCafiero at the end of the meeting with President Alberto Fernández (@alferdez) with the chancellor @hayashi09615064. https://t.co/XAkToDmPCH
– Casa Rosada (@CasaRosada) January 10, 2023
The chancellor, in parallel, added “all the links we have from the scientific and technological point of view, the aerospace industry, the nuclear technology industry for peaceful purposes and also the development we have in Antarctica.”
Cafiero specified that in the afternoon he will have another meeting with his Japanese counterpart at the San Martín Palace, in which they will “develop another part of the bilateral agenda and strengthen the projects that lie ahead.”
“We have very important investments. The President highlighted the work that Toyota is carrying out in Argentina,” the official highlighted.
In this regard, he stressed that Toyota “is a Japanese capital company that is carrying out its third shift and that speaks clearly of the potential it has found and development in our country, and above all the potential we have because approximately 70% of the production is exported from what the plant in Zárate does”.
“We have very important investments. The President highlighted the work that Toyota is carrying out in Argentina”santiago cafiero
Likewise, he stressed that “we have ties that are closer from an economic point of view and from a commercial point of view, we have recovered production levels after the pandemic hit.”
“We are at 1,700 million dollars in trade to almost 2,000 million dollars, we are going to be reaching this if we add services,” he stressed.
Furthermore, he said that it is “close to being able to advance in the bilateral agenda that has to do with trade, economic and financial issues.”
Cafiero highlighted that Japan “is very important because of the seat it occupies in the International Monetary Fund and multilateral credit organizations where Argentina still has current programs as well as the Paris Club, so it is important to take an overview of the recovery of the Argentine economy”.
Finally, he indicated that the President “had a very specific detail of how the exit from the pandemic has progressed in the three years of recession 2018 and 2019 and 2020 with respect to the pandemic, but that already in 2021 the accounts were They start ordering.”
“The economy begins to grow in 2022, there is an economy that also grows more than 5% in the projections we have for this year,” he concluded.
