“These changes make it easier for our militaries to engage in discussions on security issues and to hold cooperative engagements that increase our capacity to tackle common challenges,” he said.

Panetta said Washington and Wellington would work together despite lingering “differences of opinion in some limited areas.”

The visit by Panetta, the first by a Pentagon chief in 30 years, signals a new era of US-New Zealand defense links breached in the mid-1980s, when Wellington declared itself nuclear-free and barred its ports to nuclear warships.

While both Washington and Wellington acknowledged the improvement in relations and defense ties, New Zealand Defense Minister Jonathan Coleman told reporters New Zealand had an independent foreign policy and that its anti-nuclear ban was not negotiable.

“I don’t think that we should get too hung up about trying to turn the clock back to pre-1986 because the reality is that the relationship is very, very good,” Coleman said at a news conference following their meeting.