Press Release: Asia – Europe meeting: Foreign ministers to deepen political dialogue

Foreign Ministers from the 15 EU member states, and ten Asian countries will meet in Madrid on 6 and 7 June 2002. The European Commission will be represented by External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten. This is the first of three key ministerial meetings this year, leading up to the ASEM Summit in Copenhagen in September: finance ministers will meet in July and economic ministers in September. The tasks of this meeting are preparation of the Summit, and the deepening of political dialogue covering a wide range of topics.