Nigeria’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Geoffrey Onyeama, has met with his Polish counterpart, Minister Witold Waszczykowski to discuss ways to boost economic, military and security ties between both countries.

Onyeama said Nigeria is eager to diversify its “mono-economy” and is ready to partner with Poland to achieve this.

“I think there is a lot that we can gain from each other,” Onyeama told reporters, speaking at a news conference alongside his Polish counterpart, Witold Waszczykowski. “It would be a real win-win relationship, Poland and Nigeria.”

Both ministers noted that Poland is attractive as a partner to Nigeria because it produces many of the same things produced by other leading economies in Europe, but at lower prices.

The talks between the two officials focused on bilateral cooperation and strategic relations in the EU-Africa framework.

Speaking earlier, Minister Witold Waszczykowski noted that “Nigeria is a big country with which we want to foster political, economic and military relations, since Nigeria is and will be our important partner in the antiterrorism coalition, among other things. Today we have mainly discussed bilateral relations. Nigeria is among major targets of our programme Go Africa.”

According to the chief of the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, both ministers also discussed security. “We talked about international security, we exchanged views on the situation in Europe and its vicinity, and on the security situation in Africa, especially with regard to the war on terrorism,”

Minister Waszczykowski stated that both countries are natural allies in combating Islamic extremism: Poland belongs to the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS, while Nigeria is battling against boko haram.

“We are interested in developing cooperation with Nigeria as part of the EU’s contacts with Africa, and in particular as part of the Union’s relations with Nigeria. We are going to support this cooperation and we will seek to fill it with substance as early as this year, at the EU-Africa meeting in Abidjan,” announced Waszczykowski.

Onyeama in turn expressed his appreciation for the achievements of the Polish economy, indicating that Nigeria could cooperate with Poland in agriculture, infrastructure, maritime and energy sectors.

The meeting with Nigeria’s delegation also provided an opportunity to seek this country’s support for Poland as a potential non-permanent member of the UN Security Council.

“I was convincing my Nigerian partner to support our bid for non-permanent UN Security Council membership and I hope I have managed to persuade him to vote for Poland,” Minister Waszczykowski said.

Responding, Minister Onyeama declared that Poland’s possible membership of the Security Council would be a great added value. He also praised Poland’s involvement in peace-keeping missions and the commitment of Polish lawyers to creating international law.