Uzbekistan, Tashkent, Feb. 7 / Trend D. Azizov /
Japan and Uzbekistan will sign a number of bilateral documents aimed at intensifying cooperation in various fields, the Uzbek National News Agency reported.
Uzbek President Islam Karimov will pay an official visit to Japan at the invitation of Prime Minister of Japan Naoto Kan on Feb. 8-10.
During the visit, the issues of expanding and intensifying Uzbek-Japanese cooperation, and important regional and international problems of mutual interest will be discussed, UzA reported.
Japan recognized the independence of Uzbekistan in December 1991. The diplomatic relations between the countries were established in late January 1992.
The Japanese Embassy in Tashkent was opened in January 1993, and the Uzbek Embassy in Tokyo opened in February 1996.
The exchange of notes of May 17, 1994, laid the legal basis for cooperation by which the two countries prolonged the 8 international treaties.
The declaration on friendship, strategic partnership and cooperation was signed between Uzbekistan and Japan during the visit of Karimov to Japan in July 2002.
The intergovernmental agreement on liberalization and mutual protection of investments entered into force in September 2009.
The Uzbek-Japanese relations are characterized by mutual respect and trust and promote not only the development of political, trade-economic and investment cooperation, but friendship, cultural and humanitarian ties.
The Japanese government supports the efforts of Uzbekistan on democratization and the transition to a market economy and sustainable economic development.
The volume of Japanese investments in the Uzbek economy has exceeded $2.3 billion. Japan invests in railway, oil and gas, energy, mining, automotive, telecommunications, electronics and textile industries.
The representative offices of large Japanese corporations, such as Mitsui, Mitsubishi, Itochu, and Marubeni were opened in Uzbekistan.
The Japanese side provided medical equipment worth 441 million yen (about $5 million) within the project to improve the equipment of the National Rehabilitation Centre and over $4 million within the grant aid of the Japanese government through anti-terrorism and security for the project to install x-ray scanning equipment at customs checkpoints on the border of Uzbekistan and neighboring countries.
The Japanese government initiated a new format for cooperation in the form of the dialogue, "Central Asia Plus Japan," in 2004. It includes five areas: political dialogue, intra-regional cooperation, promoting of trade and investment cooperation, intellectual dialogue, cultural ties, exchange of human resources.