Above: OECS Director General Len Ishmael and EU Ambassador to the OECS Mikael Barfod

By the Caribbean Journal staff

Mikael Barfod has officially become the European Union’s first-ever ambassador to the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States.

Barfod, who is also the EU’s Ambassador to Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean, presented his credentials to OECS Director General Dr Len Ishmael earlier this week.

“The establishment of diplomatic relations between our two organizations is a crucial step in the history of our partnership, because today, we are responding in a bold, genuine and practical way to the demands of the time by entering deliberately into a new relationship, very much in the nature of a paradigm shift,” Ishmael said.

Barfod said the EU was committed to developing the subregional grouping, pointing to what he called the “tremendous achievements” of the OECS in integration.

Ishmael and Barfod both noted the “strong commonalities” between the EU and the OECS, calling for a “new and deepened partnership.”

The United States and Brazil have also accredited Ambassadors to the OECS in the last year.