The Secretary-General of the Gulf Cooperation Council for Arab States, Dr. Naif Falah Mubarak Al-Hajraf, has stressed the importance of advancing the areas of joint cooperation between the GCC and the European Union in order to serve common interests, the Saudi Press Agency reported.

Al-Hajraf met on Friday with President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen in the Bahraini capital, Manama, on the sidelines of the "Manama Dialogue 2022" forum.

The three-day forum kicked off on Friday with a wide participation of more than 400 officials from different countries.

During the meeting, Al-Hajraf and von der Leyen reviewed a number of issues of common interest and GCC-EU relations.

They also discussed free trade negotiations between the two sides, and the importance of inviting technical teams to review their developments, in order to serve common interests and strengthen trade and economic ties between the two parties.