Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec.19 / Trend, M. Aliyev /
GUAM will become one of the most influential organizations in the world in the near future, First Deputy Speaker of the Azerbaijani Parliament Ziyafat Asgarov said at the fifth meeting of the GUAM Parliamentary Assembly (PA) in Baku on Wednesday.
Asgarov said the role of parliamentary diplomacy is growing in today's world.
He said that this meeting became the largest for its composition among the meetings that the organization has held so far.
"We live in such a time when regional integration processes are ongoing. GUAM began to play an important role in ensuring regional security," Asgarov said.
The meeting is being attended by national delegations of the GUAM PA, Secretary General of the organization, delegations of the Baltic Assembly, parliament of the Benelux countries, the parliamentary delegations of the Visegrad Group member countries, as well as representatives of ministries and other agencies of Azerbaijan, embassies of GUAM PA member countries and partner countries accredited in Azerbaijan.
GUAM was established by the post-Soviet countries in 1997 during the EU presidential summit in Strasbourg. In 1999, Uzbekistan joined the organisation, and left four years later. A decision was made to rename GUAM as an international organisation entitled 'Organisation for Democracy and Economic Development - GUAM', at the body's first summit in Kiev in 2006.