Portugal's Defense Minister Nuno Severiano Teixeira said on Friday that the country will focus on aiding Africa

during its six-month presidency of the European Union (EU), according to reports reaching here.

Portugal will organize a seminar in October on African security and aid, especially on the training of African armed forces, Teixeira said in the meeting with Karl Erjavec, his Slovenian counterpart, in the Slovenian capital Ljubljana.

The training would focus on capacity building for peace-keeping and crises resolution, he said.

The priorities were agreed upon at a meeting of Portugal, Slovenia and Germany, which also covered such issues as boosting relations between the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the United Nations (UN), and the financing of EU forces.

Portugal plans to reinforce EU-NATO alliances via regular dialogue and meetings between the NATO secretary general and the head of the EU's Foreign Policy and Common Security unit.

Germany is the current president of the EU and Slovenia will take over from Portugal in the first half of 2008.

Source: Xinhua