NZ PM to visit Thailand

BANGKOK, November 4 (TNA) - New Zealand's Prime Minister John Phillip Key is scheduled to pay an official visit to Thailand as the guest of the Thai government from November 17-20, 2013. Accompanied by New Zealand's 30 top business operators, Key will, among his other activities, meet his Thai counterpart Yingluck Shinawatra to exchange views on how to further strengthen bilateral relations between the two allied nations, particularly on trade and investment, tourism, education, science and technology and innovations. People of New Zealand and Thailand have had close ties since the two countries established their diplomatic relations on March 26, 1956, with two-way trade reaching 1.63 billion US dollars, or about 50 billion baht, last year and more than 100,000 New Zealand tourists having visited Thailand annually, while about 17,000 Thai travelers have visited New Zealand yearly, excluding over 3,100 Thai youths studying in the southwestern Pacific island state currently. Like other regional leaders, Key has accepted the Thai prime minister's invitation to attend the next summit of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), to be soon held in Bangkok. (TNA)