New Zealand to open embassy in Cairo

6.00pm

New Zealand will open an embassy in Egypt in 2006, Prime Minister Helen Clark announced today.

"The growing prominence of the Middle East in world affairs calls for greater attention, and New Zealanders have a direct stake in the stability of this region," she said.

Budget 2004 had set aside $1.65 million to allow work to begin on the new post.

Egypt had a significant and moderating influence throughout the Middle East and beyond, Helen Clark said.

"It is a leader of the Arab world, respected among Islamic countries and members of the Non-Aligned Movement," she said.

The Non-Aligned Movement is an 116-nation group comprised mostly of developing countries in Asia, Africa, the Middle East and Latin America.

"An embassy in Cairo would help protect and expand New Zealand's interests in a large and challenging market."

Egypt was the second-largest buyer of New Zealand goods in the Middle East, taking exports of $114 million annually.

A post in Cairo would support the important dairy trade New Zealand has with Iraq -- one of the largest whole milk powder markets in the region -- the prime minister said.

"Our relations with Egypt are excellent," she said.

"We work closely together on nuclear disarmament issues in the New Agenda Coalition and in multi-lateral organisations such as the World Trade Organisation."

New Zealand has since 1982 been part of the Sinai Multinational Force and observers monitoring the Egypt-Israel border.

New Zealand troops were based in Egypt in both world wars, fighting in the crucial 1942 battle of El Alamein.

El Alamein was the decisive battle of the North African campaign, in which German and Italian forces under Major General Erwin Rommel were driven out of the region.

New Zealand's ambassador to Saudi Arabia has been accredited to Cairo since 1985.

Egypt became the first Arab country to set up a mission in Wellington in 1975 -- but closed it in 1988.

Since then the Egyptian ambassador to Canberra has been accredited to New Zealand.

- NZPA