NEWS

20th anniversary of the establishment of Slovenian-Japanese diplomatic relations

On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries, the Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Janša and the Prime Minister of Japan, Yoshihiko Noda, exchanged congratulatory messages to mark this important event.  In its message to his Japanese counterpart, Prime Minister Janša expressed his delight at the fine development of friendship and trust between the two countries and their people over the past two decades. He pointed out that this anniversary is an opportunity to identify new areas in order to upgrade the previous good cooperation and friendly relations established between the two nations. While expressing his optimism based on the enhancement of other, higher forms of economic and technological cooperation, he also stressed the Slovenian Government's full support to an early implementation of the EU-Japan free trade agreement which will also improve Slovenia's chances to intensify its trade with Japan. In its message to his Slovenian counterpart, the Japanese Prime Minister Noda took a similar view by expressing his satisfaction with the enhancement of friendship between the two countries and intensified cooperation in the economy, culture, science and technology. 

From 1992 until today, Slovenia and Japan have introduced several new forms of cooperation, with Slovenia's humanitarian aid to post-earthquake Japan being one of the most intensive in recent years. This year also saw two events that need to be highlighted: the recent meeting between the Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Janša and the Chairman, President and CEO of the Hitachi Corporation, Takashi Kawamura, and the September seminar organised by the Slovenian Public Agency for Entrepreneurship and Foreign Investments (JAPTI), the Japanese Embassy in Slovenia and the Düsseldorf office of the Japan External Trade Organisation (JETRO). Both events, i.e. the meeting with the Chairman, President and CEO of Hitachi, the fourth largest corporation in Japan that intends to intensify its cooperation with Slovenia, and the aforementioned seminar attended by forty representatives of high-profile Düsseldorf-based Japanese companies demonstrate that there are several new opportunities to "upgrade" the maturity of relations between the two countries established over the past twenty years. Moreover, a cooperation agreement between the respective agencies for technological development is also expected to be signed soon. Its aim is to provide for new opportunities to enhance internationalisation of the economy and to introduce higher forms of cooperation in developing new technologies.