Photo (left to right): VP Amb (ret) Yossi Gal, Hebrew University External Relations and Advancement, Britain’s Ambassador to Israel, HE Neil Wigan OBE, UK Minister for the Middle East, Amanda Milling MP, Prof Uriel Levy, Director of the HU Nanotech Center, Department of Applied Physics
Middle East Minister makes first official visit to Israel.
Middle East Minister, Rt. Hon. Amanda Milling MP, was “delighted” to make her first official trip to Israel on Wednesday where she praised the UK-Israel relationship as having “never been stronger”. In a meeting with Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister Idan Roll, Milling spoke of her belief that the UK-Israel Bilateral Roadmap will “define the next decade of UK-Israeli cooperation across a range of sectors, including defence, security, trade, cyber and science”. Heralding efforts to secure an “ambitious” Free Trade Agreement, the Minister reflected on how the UK is Israel’s largest European trading partner – worth around £5 billion – and the UK-Israel Tech Hub (the first of its kind) benefits the UK economy by over £1 billion. The trip began with a visit to the Peres Centre for Peace and Innovation where she saw how it was “promoting community tolerance and peace in Israel through science and innovation”. In the Israeli city of Lod she met with NGO Search for Common Ground to learn about the promotion of cooperation and coexistence, as Lod is a mixed Jewish and Arab city. The Minister also made an “eye-opening” visit to the Hebrew University, where she learned about nanotechnology, which she said would help provide solutions to problems faced worldwide by producing more renewable energy and fighting diseases, and how the UK and Israel can work together to implement them.
Click here to hear direct from Minister Milling