Canada and the Bahamas have held discussions on the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) to be held in Sri Lanka. The Bahamas Foreign Ministry said that its Foreign Affairs Minister Fred Mitchell discussed the Sri Lanka summit with visiting Canadian Minister of State of Foreign Affairs Diane Ablonczy at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

“We are fellow Commonwealth countries and have been working in a spirit of friendly cooperation since The Bahamas attained its independence almost forty years ago. The common themes are democracy, the rule of law, respect for the rights of the individual including the right to privacy and the security of the citizens, their persons and property. We exchanged views on these issues today, particularly in light of the upcoming Heads of Government conference in Sri Lanka in the fall,” Fred Mitchell said in a statement.

Canada has been pushing for the summit to be moved out of Sri Lanka but it is not clear if that issue was discussed during the Bahamas meeting. The Canadian Minister of State is on a seven country tour of the Caribbean region, the Bahamas Foreign Ministry said.

Source: The Sunday Leader. (The Sunday Leader is an English-language Sri Lankan Sunday newspaper)