John Key to Washington for talks

John Key

Prime Minister John Key will pay an official visit to the US on July 22, during which he will have a meeting with President Barack Obama.

Despite having exchanged thoughts many times on the sidelines of APEC, Nuclear Summit and other meetings, Mr Key’s presence in Washington would help thaw relations with the world’s most powerful nation.

At a personal level, Mr Key and Mr Obama have got along well. They both share an ambitious future for their respective countries, and both have brought fresh thought process to their political and administrative streams.

Both will turn 50 next month.

Relations between New Zealand and the US have undergone a paradigm shift from the days when the Left-Centre Government was at the helm in Wellington and the Neo-Conservative Republican administration headed by George W Bush in Washington DC.

The ‘Washington Declaration,’ signed last year in the New Zealand Capital during the visit of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was yet another landmark in the bilateral relations between the two countries.

Mr Key’s talks in the US are expected to cover Counter-Terrorism, Nuclear Non-Proliferation, situation in the Afghanistan and issues related to the South Pacific.

The US understands the importance of strengthening relations with democratic countries in Asia Pacific with the region gaining more importance in the world affairs.

Mr Obama understands this concept much better than his predecessors, having grown up in Hawaii (where John Key has a holiday home) and assimilated the Polynesian culture. This would have helped him appreciate the sentiments of  the countries in the region.

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