Baku, Azerbaijan, Aug. 31
Trend:
The political consultations between the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan have taken place in Tashkent, Kazinform reported referring to the press service of the Kazakh Foreign Ministry.
The Kazakh delegation was led by Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan Galymzhan Koishybayev, the Uzbek delegation was led by Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Uzbekistan Dilshod Akhatov.
During the consultations, priority attention was paid to the implementation of the agreements reached during the mutual state visits of the President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev and the President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev in 2017.
The sides exchanged views on topical issues of bilateral and multilateral cooperation in the political, trade, economic, cultural and humanitarian spheres. Various aspects of the regional and international agenda were discussed.
"Kazakhstan considers Uzbekistan as a fraternal country, a good neighbor, a key political and economic partner in Central Asia. The head of state attaches great importance to regional cooperation, in which Uzbekistan occupies a special place," Galymzhan Koishybayev said.
They stressed the need to expand trade and economic cooperation, increase exports and imports of new types of products, in order to implement the task set by the presidents of the two countries to achieve the level of $5 billion in mutual trade turnover volume by 2020.
The Uzbek diplomat noted that the Kazakh-Uzbek cooperation today demonstrates high dynamics in all areas.
"We are proud of Kazakhstan's success on the world stage, your support is highly appreciated and we are ready to expand our cooperation on all issues of a bilateral nature. Uzbekistan attaches priority significance to the development of relations with Kazakhstan," Dilshod Akhatov said.
During the talks, the parties agreed to recommend the state authorities of the two countries to continue studying the possibilities of implementing major joint projects in promising sectors of the economy.
The successful implementation of activities in the framework of the current Year of Uzbekistan in Kazakhstan was noted. The course of preparation for the forthcoming Year of Kazakhstan in Uzbekistan in 2019 was discussed.
Regional aspects of cooperation in the context of the agreements reached following the results of the working (consultative) meeting of the heads of Central Asian states on March 15, 2018 in Astana were also touched upon.
The head of the Kazakh delegation thanked the Uzbek side for the high level of organization of consultations and invited the Uzbek counterpart to Astana to continue the bilateral dialogue between the Ministries of Foreign Affairs.