Brussels, 13 February 2016/ ACP/ FAO/ OIF: The African, Caribbean and Pacific Group of States (ACP), Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie (OIF), supported by the Commonwealth Secretariat and the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP), have wrapped up a symposium pledging to build new partnerships to empower women and youth.

[Delivered during the plenary session of the 10th Ministerial Conference of the WTO, held 15-18 December 2015 in Nairobi, Kenya].

Brussels, 14 December 2015/ ACP: The Secretary General of the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) Group of States H.E Dr. Patrick Gomes welcomes the historic outcome of the Paris Climate Change Conference (COP21), which accepted a global agreement on climate change on Saturday.

Paris, 8 December 2015/ ACP: The Secretary General of the ACP Group of States H.E Dr Patrick Gomes called for an international agreement on climate change that is ambitious, legally-binding and inclusive, while highlighting the strategy signed recently between the ACP and the European Union for €475 million to be dedicated to climate change, resilience building and the environment under the Intra-ACP envelope of the 11^th European Development Fund up to 2020.

[Protocols]

I thank you for the honour of addressing the Joint Parliamentary Assembly once again. Before I go ahead, I wish to place on record the appreciation of ACP Members, and indeed of the ACP Group for the efforts that the Parliament has taken to ensure that this particular session of the Assembly takes place.

Our meetings come at a difficult time; the ugly pall of terrorism hangs over our countries. The terrorist’s attacks by religious extremists in Paris last month being another manifestation of what has been happening in African for quite some time now, namely the Al-Shabab menace in Somalia and Kenya, Boko Haram in Nigeria, Chad, Cameroon, and Niger and al-Qaida affiliates in Mali.