Bin Ali visits Algeria

Tunisian President Zein al-Abidin Bin Ali starts an official visit to Algiers in the mid of January 2002. The visit which will comes at the invitation of the Algerian President Abdul Aziz Butaflika will last for two days.

The Algerian foreign minister Abdul Aziz Balkhadem said in statements he made on Sunday that this visit falls in the course of consultations between the two states and discussing means of developing bilateral relations as well as discussing the mechanism of Arab Maghreb work and the need of developing this work in light of developments taking place in the world following the incidents of September 11, 2001.

Balkhadem considered that it is necessary that the Arab Maghreb member states will tighten inter relations through regional federations, noting that the visit of the Tunisian President comes few days before the meeting of the meeting of the foreign ministers of the Maghreb federation states due to be held in Algiers on January 17 and 18, 2002.

Balkhadem held a press conference to explain the dimensions of the partnership agreement his country signed with the European Union. He stressed that this agreement serves its political, security and economic interests for the long run and avails Algeria to get out of the international isolation imposed by conditions in Algeria during the last ten years. He indicated that by signing the association agreement with the European Union, Algeria has achieved great strides in the negotiations to joining the World Trade Organizations, adding these negotiations will be resumed very soon.