(MENAFN- Emirates News Agency (WAM)) The United Arab Emirates formally confirmed its participation in EXPO 2015 Milan at an official signing ceremony held on the occasion of a keynote speech, delivered by Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti, to over a thousand representatives from over a hundred countries.
Described as the biggest event to take place in Italy in 2015, the next World Expo has drawn strong support for its timely theme of �Feeding the Planet: Energy for Life'. The UAE has pledged to make a significant contribution to the success of the EXPO which will be dealing with one of the most crucial issues of the 21st century.
Reaffirming the importance of this cooperation, Secretary-General of B.I.E., the international body responsible for coordinating World Expos, Vicente Loscertales, emphasized that there is a shared responsibility on behalf of both organizers and participants to create a successful EXPO that has a lasting legacy.
Commenting on the steps being taken to ensure a successful pavilion at EXPO 2015, H.H. Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, UAE's Foreign Minister and Chairman of the UAE National Media Council (which is responsible for implementing the UAE's participation), recalled the UAE's strong commitment to World Expos, including its recent successes in Hannover (EXPO 2000), Zaragoza (EXPO 2008), Shanghai (EXPO 2010), Yeosu (EXPO 2012) and its bid to host World Expo 2020 in the city of Dubai. "We congratulate the Italian government for supporting EXPO 2015", he stated, "and we assure the organisers of our strong support to create a truly engaging event that focuses worldwide attention on the challenge we face to produce enough food to feed our planet".
The signing ceremony, involving 13 countries, was the closing act of a three-day International Participants' Meeting that focused attention on both the theme of EXPO 2015 and on the steps being made in Italy to create a ground-breaking mega-event around the unifying subject of �food'. Along with the UAE, other countries that took the opportunity to formalise their participation at the meeting included Saudi Arabia, Bolivia, Russia, Guatemala, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Republic of Moldova, Senegal, Tunisia and Uganda. Germany and Switzerland had signed agreements prior to the meeting and 105 countries have so far agreed to participate.
The UAE's strong participation in EXPO 2015 should "send a strong message to B.I.E. delegates, their governments and indeed the general public, that we are committed to do everything possible to win the bid to host EXPO 2020", stated Reem Ibrahim Al Hashemi, Minister of State and Managing Director of the Higher Committee for Hosting the World Expo 2020 in Dubai. "We have the knowledge, experience, infrastructure, resources, energy and the sheer determination to create a new World Expo in 2020 that will be a worthy sequel to EXPO 2015", she added.
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