Foreign Minister, Grigol Vashadze, will be visiting New Zealand, Australia and then Fiji from September 28 to October 6, the Georgian Foreign Ministry said Tuesday.

During the visit, which will be the first-ever by Georgian foreign minister in the Australasia region, Vashadze will meet his counterparts in each of the three countries.

The visit comes less than a month after Georgian parliamentary delegation, led by parliamentary speaker Davit Bakradze, visited Australia and New Zealand – the trip, which, according to the Georgian side, aimed at establishing closer bilateral contacts with “leading countries” of the Oceania region, to promote in that part of the world “support towards Georgia's territorial integrity and policy of non-recognition of occupied territories.”

Vashadze’s visit will come less than two weeks after Tuvalu, the tiny South Pacific island nation, recognized Georgia’s breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. There was no immediate public reaction from the Georgian Foreign Ministry, which established diplomatic relations with Tuvalu in February; it said on September 26, that it was still “monitoring” reports about Tuvalu’s recognition of Sokhumi and Tskhinvali.