Parliament’s Speaker, Anton Tabone, will be leading a parliamentary delegation to Portugal from today to Saturday at the invitation of Jaime Gama, president of the Assembly of the Republic in Portugal. Mr Tabone will be accompanied by Mario DeMarco, Roderick Galdes and Joe Mangion, diplomatic officer at the Speaker’s Secretariat.

Talks will focus on enhancing cooperation between the parliamentary institutions of the two countries, complementing relations at the inter-governmental level. Discussions will also deal with cooperation in multilateral parliamentary fora, such as the Euro-Med Parliamentary Assembly, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Mediterranean, the Inter-Parliamentary Union and the forthcoming meeting of Presidents of Parliaments of the 5+5 Group in Rome later this year.

Mr Tabone will address the Committee on International and European Relations of the Assembly and is expected to call on the President of Portugal, the Prime Minister and the Opposition Leader.

Portugal presently holds the presidency of the European Union.