Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, Sept. 5 / Trend H. Hasanov /
The effective cooperation between Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan is important not only for the two friendly countries, but for the development of mutually beneficial cooperation in the region, Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov said at the meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers today, the Turkmen government reported. A number of joint international and regional projects were cited as an example.
Their successful implementation will contribute to intensifying the cooperation in various fields, as well as the well-being of people and sustainable socio-economic development of the neighbouring countries.
According to the Turkmen president's decree, a delegation headed by the Deputy Prime Minister of the Republic dealing with the issues of the fuel-energy complex, Baimuradov Hojamuhammedov went to Astana, the official Turkmen source said today.
The fifth meeting of the Turkmen-Kazakh Commission on Economic, Scientific, Technological and Cultural Cooperation was held in Astana in late August. The fuel and energy, transport, communication, tourism, agriculture, trade, economy were discussed.
Particular importance is attached to the transport and communication sector. As an example, there is a joint project to build the railway North-South, which is implemented on the basis of the intergovernmental agreement signed between Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Iran in 2007.
The project implementation will open the way to the Central Asia and the Persian Gulf to Europe and Asia. Similar opportunity will appear to transit the goods from the countries in South and South-East Asia, the Indian Ocean to the North and East Europe - through Iran, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Russia.
This way is three times shorter than the route through the Suez Canal. The new railway will play a significant role in creating a new social infrastructure of desert regions in the Caspian region and the northern regions - from Bereket to the border with Kazakhstan. The projected transportation volume via this route is up to 12 million tons a year.
The two countries are also connected with a large infrastructure projects in the fuel-energy complex. Thus, a gas pipeline was opened from Turkmenistan to China via Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan in December 2009.
In a letter to President Berdimuhamedov in May 2012, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev proposed to hold the talks at the highest level and invited him to pay an official visit to Astana in 2012.