Since last year we have been engaged in a dialogue based on mutual trust with the Government of Namibia with a view to finding a joint approach to the painful colonial past.

I have discussed the way forward with my Namibian counterpart in Berlin and, most recently, in New York at the end of September.

We think that the time has come to intensify and formalise this exchange between the Governments of our two countries. We have agreed that both sides will appoint a distinguished interlocutor to pursue this dialogue.

I am grateful to Ruprecht Polenz, the long-serving Chairman of the German Bundestag Committee on Foreign Affairs, for accepting this office.

Our aim is, in further talks with the Namibian Government, to reach a common assessment of the past and, on that basis, to identify ways of developing strategies to shape our continued bilateral relations.