On November 28, Ashgabat hosted the 15th meeting of the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO).
As the TDH notes , Turkmenistan, which joined the ECO in 1992, presides over the organization this year.
The meeting took place in the fashionable Garagum hotel, which was opened on November 19.
In his speech, President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov urged those present at the summit to develop cooperation in the fields of transport and energy, and also spoke about the implementation of projects for the TAPI gas pipeline, TAP transmission lines and the railway from Turkmenistan to Afghanistan .
Note that it was originally planned that the railway would connect Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Tajikistan, but Berdymukhamedov did not mention Tajikistan. In 2017, a conflict arose between Ashgabat and Dushanbe over the latter’s reluctance to build its own section of the railway after the resumed train traffic between Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. At a meeting of the presidents of the two countries in Ashgabat in August 2021, the parties discussed transport corridors, but they did not talk about the TAT project.
In particular, Turkmenistan is interested in transport corridors Uzbekistan-Turkmenistan-Iran-Oman and Afghanistan-Turkmenistan-Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey.
Speaking about the situation in Afghanistan, the head of Turkmenistan called for urgent and effective humanitarian aid to be provided to the neighboring country.
Berdimuhamedov expressed interest in developing mutual trade and interaction between business circles, as well as cooperation in the field of medicine. “Alone, this or that country can achieve only temporary successes in the fight against the pandemic,” the President of Turkmenistan said and proposed to establish channels of exchange of experience in the field of combating infectious diseases within the framework of the ECO. “Our states have something to offer each other,” the Turkmen head of the TDH is quoted as saying.
The Secretary General of the ECO, Khursav Noziri , who then took the floor , noted that in order to create conditions for safe trade that does not have any risks, and to facilitate the conduct of operational economic transactions, a clearing union of the ECO should be created between the Central Banks of the organization’s member countries.
Representatives of the ECO member states who spoke also expressed interest in developing cooperation within the organization in the fields of energy, transport, trade, tourism, regional stability and countering the pandemic.
President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon noted that “trade between ECO member states is only 8% of their total trade, which reflects the insufficient use of trade opportunities between states.”
Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Askar Mamin said that the Turkmen-Kazakh trade turnover from January to September 2021 increased by 43.6% to $ 144 million due to the growth of Kazakhstani exports by 78.1%. The volume of cargo transportation for ten months of this year with the participation of the railways of Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, incl. transit to Afghanistan and Iran exceeded 1 million tons.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan congratulated Azerbaijan on the victory in the Patriotic War and said that it would help normalize the situation in the region. Also, President of Pakistan Arif Alvi congratulated Ilham Aliyev on his victory , recalling the problem of Kashmir, which, in his opinion, was occupied by India.
Wiki Help . “Patriotic War of 2020” is the official name in Azerbaijan of a large-scale armed conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh in the fall of 2020.
Erdogan also spoke about the need for international recognition of the Turkish Cypriots and called on “all friendly and fraternal countries” to support Turkey’s proposal on the issue of Northern Cyprus.
No state in the world, with the exception of Turkey, officially recognizes the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus as an independent state.
Alvi warned of an impending economic collapse in Afghanistan, which, if not assisted, could plunge the country and the entire region into chaos.
Following the talks, the parties adopted the Ashgabat Consensus for Action, in which, among other things, the organization’s participants outlined their intentions to cooperate in the fight against COVID-19 and its consequences for the region’s economy, provide support to Afghanistan, increase the low level of intra-regional trade, and simplify trade and investment procedures. develop regional telecommunications, mitigate the negative impact of ICT ( probably, we are talking about information and communication technologies, – approx. HT ) and cooperate in the field of cybersecurity.
In addition, in one of the points, the ECO countries reject unilateral sanctions and economic pressure and express their support to the member states of the organization affected by such measures. How this support will be expressed is not specified.
Also, the signatories undertake to “study the possibilities of investing in restoration and reconstruction projects in the liberated territories of Azerbaijan.”
In 2022, the chairmanship of the ECO passes to Uzbekistan.
Source: Chronicles of Turkmenistan