The Foreign Ministry denied claims made by the Labour Party’s spokesman for foreign affairs Leo Brincat that Foreign Minister Michael Frendo was constantly ignoring Parliament.

The minister, it said, had regularly given reports to the Foreign and European Affairs Committee of the House of Representatives on his activities. And the meeting with Richard Cachia Caruana, Malta’s Permanent Representative to the European Union, was postponed, not cancelled, in February, because Dr Frendo was indisposed.

It added that the Foreign Minister made every effort – notwithstanding his schedule which, as Foreign Minister of a European Union country, included constant travel – to keep Parliament informed particularly through the Foreign and European Affairs Committee. These efforts and this reporting would continue, as has already been the case in the past.

It was clear, the Foreign Ministry said, that the Malta Labour Party was still without properly laid out policies on foreign affairs and had not managed to produce an alternative to the strategy called Strategic Objectives of Malta’s Foreign Affairs Policy issued by Foreign Minister Michael Frendo in February 2006, widely recognised as the document which delineated Malta’s foreign policy agenda.