Martine Pinville, Minister of State for Commerce, Small-Scale Industry, Consumer Affairs and the Social and Solidarity Economy of France, called on the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mangala Samaraweera, at the Foreign Ministry today.

The visit of Martine Pinville to Sri Lanka is one of the first undertaken by a French high level official since the new Government took office in 2015.

Both Ministers expressed their keenness to transform the longstanding bilateral relationship into a dynamic political, trade and business partnership and discussed avenues of diversifying the areas of cooperation.

Minister Samaraweera also mentioned that Sri Lanka hosted the "France Travel Agents Association Congress", a landmark event for Sri Lanka tourism and for its image abroad. Sri Lanka not only won the bid to host it, but also got the opportunity to showcase the island's many attractions to over 700 French Travel Agents.