Sultan NASIR al-Muhammad al-Ahmad al-Sabah, the Prime Minister of the oil-rich Middle Eastern nation of Kuwait, is due to pay an official state visit to Trinidad and Tobago next month.

Foreign Affairs Minister Paula Gopee-Scoon announced al-Sabah’s planned trip during Thursday’s post-Cabinet news conference at the Diplomatic Centre in St Ann’s and said it would be the first visit of such a high level official from an Arab state to this country.

’The visit is expected to take place from October 7 to 9 ...The State of Kuwait had written to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the request came from them and the Prime Minister has agreed to the visit and today Cabinet has endorsed it as well,’ Gopee-Scoon said.

Kuwait is the fifth largest oil producer in the world and is a member of the Organisation of Oil Exporting Countries (OPEC) that is comprised of the world’s main oil exporters.

This country has no formal diplomatic, trading relations or government to government agreements with Kuwait and neither does any of the other 14 Caribbean Community (Caricom) member states.

Prime Minister Patrick Manning and Finance Minister Karen Nunez-Tesheira had both travelled to the Middle Eastern state of Dubai last year, as part of the Government’s efforts to promote the Trinidad and Tobago International Financial Centre. Gopee-Scoon made reference to this when she announced Al-Sabah’s visit.

’So one is not entirely surprised that ... the (Middle Eastern) region is taking note of Trinidad and Tobago,’ Gopee-Scoon said last week.

It is expected that energy and investment matters would be high on the agenda of any talks during al-Sabah’s visit.

Al-Sabah’s trip comes just over a month before this country hosts the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in November.

Asked about Fiji’s suspension from the Commonwealth on Monday and its resulting absence from the CHOGM, Gopee-Scoon said the Foreign Affairs Ministry had been monitoring the Fiji situation ’very closely’.