Kazakhstan which will chair in the OSCE in 2010 aims to preserve the unity of the organization and make it even more relevant in the new circumstances, Kazakh Secretary of State Kanat Saudabayev said at an international conference on "Modern Kazakhstan and Path to Europe" on Mya 21, RIA Novosti reported.
Saudabayev said Kazakhstan's chairmanship in the OSCE "gives the entire Euro-Atlantic community a good opportunity to synthesize a vision of international security in the West and east of Vienna and develop new mechanisms of interaction and confrontation through modern challenges."
Saudabayev believes that many elements of the Kazakh experience of "the maintenance of ethno-cultural diversity and religious tolerance can be quite interesting for the European, especially those who are faced with negative trends in the relationship amongst residents of their communities."
"In turn, Kazakhstan is ready to study a positive experience of encouraging religious tolerance in society, and multiculturalism, which accumulated in Europe after the World War II and adapt it to our reality," the secretary of state said.
Another factor in ensuring global security will be proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and nuclear disarmament, Saudabayev said. "Here, Kazakhstan intends to continue to play an active role in cooperation with the United States, Russia and Europe to seek solutions to contemporary problems in this field," he said.
Among other priorities of Kazakhstan's chairmanship in the OSCE, the Secretary of State highlighted " drawing attention of the pan-European organizations to the need to strengthen security in our sensitive region as an important factor for security of Europe itself."
"In complications of the situation in Afghanistan, a special attention will be attached to intensify the search for solutions to the Afghan problem, we can talk about bringing the OSCE's opportunities to establish a security belt around Afghanistan to reduce the transit of Afghan heroin through Central Asia to Europe," the Secretary of State Saudabayev said.
The Secretary of State also noted that under his chairmanship at the OSCE, Kazakhstan as a country affected more than many other of man-made environmental disasters, will attract the attention of the Europeans to solve environmental problems in Central Asia and the post-Soviet area. "Europe also has invaluable experience which is necessary to use very, very active, especially as the inter-state cooperation in solving environmental problems is an integral part of one of the OSCE's three priorities," he said.
"Our chairmanship at the OSCE is a powerful catalyst and a unique opportunity for a qualitative leap in the development of the country, further strengthening our cooperation with countries in Europe, we must understand that Kazakhstan in 2010 and next years will differ significantly from today's Kazakhstan," the Secretary of State said.