Address for 4" February 2001

We are honoured here to welcome His Excellency The Honourable High Commissioner for Malta Mr lves Debarro and his wife for the fist time here in Wellington

The Maltese Association of Wellington Inc. is also pleased to once again welcome amongst us The Honary Consul for Malta from Auckland Mrs Patricia Thake.

It gives us great pleasure by  your visit and meeting us and we like to take this opportunity to ask for your assistance in the future if and when the occasion arises to include Wellington, Auckland and Christchurch on visiting business and other delegations to Australasia in their itinerary.

Also if possible when there are telecommunication Specials from Malta to Australia for us in New Zealand to qualify for the same seeing that we are so close together and so well represented diplomatically by yourselves.

We again extend our welcome and thank you for all the assistance you give us from time to time. We wish your visit here in New Zealand to be both enjoyable and fruitful for all.

Mr. Ives Debaro's speech

In his speech Mr de Barro thanked Mr Hannaford and the Maltese Association for the invitation to meet them. He said that the purpose of his visit was to present his credentials as the official representative of the Maltese government to the government of New Zealand, This establishes the authority for him to deal with the New Zealand government on matters that affect Maltese citizens and the Maltese government. Mr de Barro expressed his desire to help the Maltese community in New Zealand and invited the committee of the Maltese Association of Wellington to contact him in Canberra as needs arose, Mr de Barro pledged, to study and discuss any issues that were brought to his attention. He said he would be clear about which were achievable and which were not.

The High Commissioner spoke about some of his recent work as High Commissioner resident in Australia including work being done with Maltese origin youth in Melbourne and Sydney. Mr de Barro urged those attending the meeting to maintain the Maltese language, heritage and culture and promised to do his best to meet requests for resources such as books and videos to assist with this. He noted that he is happy to forward news about work being done with Maltese origin youth in Australia and also that it is now possible to get the daily news of Malta in both Maltese and English on the internet. An additional point was that he would encourage the Prime Minister of Malta, Dr Fenech Adami, to include a short visit to New Zealand during his forthcoming visit to Brisbane for the meeting of the Commonwealth Heads of Mission later this year.