MEXICO CITY: Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe left Mexico on Sunday having struck a series of energy deals and headed for Trinidad and Tobago, his next stop on a tour of Latin America.

The Japanese leader and his wife received a red-carpet sendoff flanked by soldiers at the presidential hangar, and were bid farewell by Foreign Minister Jose Antonio Meade, according to a statement.

Abe, whose five-country visit comes on the heels of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s, met Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto for talks during his two-day stay that ended with the signing of a raft of deals on Friday.

The new agreements include one between Mexican state oil firm Pemex and Japan’s development bank, and another between Pemex and the Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation.

Published in Dawn, July 28th, 2014