KUALA LUMPUR, March 11 — Newly-appointed Foreign Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein said today he will prioritise mending bilateral relations with Saudi Arabia as a main focus.
Malaysiakini reported him as saying that an invitation has been extended to his Saudi counterpart Prince Faisal Farhan to come to Malaysia and visit both Hishammuddin and his deputy Datuk Kamaruddin Jaafar.
“One of the priorities is that we will correct our relationship with Saudi Arabia,” he said during a welcoming ceremony for him today at Wisma Putra.
Hishammuddin added that Faisal is one of the several individuals he will speak to on the phone today, as he will also speak to his other counterparts from China, Indonesia, Singapore, and Thailand.
The minister later said he will also try to improve Malaysia’s relationship with India, amid speculation that New Delhi intends to ban Malaysian palm oil imports following a cooling of relations last year after then-Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad commented on the unrest in Jammu and Kashmir.
“I am trying to manage that because we do not live on an island and Malaysia is a not a huge super power. A small country can shake the world if we can also ensure those who are the shakers of the world are close to us,” he said.
In today’s Cabinet meeting, Hishammuddin said the Covid-19 outbreak was the main topic of discussion, and he will ask other countries affected by the outbreak such as China, Italy, and Singapore to share their experiences in handling the problem.
In turn this will allow Malaysia to obtain the best practices from these countries, and is beneficial in terms of evacuation Malaysians from other countries as well as on the vaccine supply issue.
Hishammuddin did not state the cause of strained relations between Putrajaya and Riyadh, but it is generally held to have stemmed from the Kuala Lumpur Summit in December last year, organised by Dr Mahathir.
Despite Dr Mahathir’s clarification with Saudi’s King Salman Abdulaziz Al Saud that the summit will not replace the existing Organisation of Islamic Cooperation, the country did not attend along with Pakistan’s Imran Ahmed Khan Niazi, who was believed to have done so out of diplomatic pressure.
