President of the Republic of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev and President of the Republic of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev continued talks with the participation of official delegations of the two countries.

The Heads of State discussed the prospects for further strengthening the strategic partnership and multifaceted cooperation between Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan. Priority attention was paid to enhancing trade and economic cooperation, including an increase in mutual trade, the implementation of cooperation projects, interaction in the sphere of transit and logistics, energy, water and agriculture. Measures to build up interregional, cultural and humanitarian exchanges were considered.

Views were exchanged on the current issues of the global and regional agenda, the interaction between international structures.

The President of Uzbekistan emphasized that the country highly appreciates the especially warm fraternal relations between the people of the two countries.

“We are making a historic decision and bringing our cooperation to the level of allied relations. We are determined to further strengthen the centuries-old friendship, good-neighborliness, mutual trust and full-scale partnership. We will use all the opportunities and resources for this. Our goal is to enrich the multifaceted collaboration of the two fraternal countries with concrete content”, Shavkat Mirziyoyev said.

The Leaders of the two countries, expressed their intention to establish the Supreme Interstate Council, the Council of Interparliamentary Cooperation and the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Republic of Uzbekistan to further strengthen the strategic partnership.

During the talks, new growth points, main priorities and target tasks of cooperation were identified.

There is a great potential for a significant expansion of the range and volumes of mutual deliveries of products in demand by replacing imports from third countries. This is confirmed by the dynamic growth in the volume of mutual trade this year, which is expected to reach a record $4 billion.

It was noted that there are all the possibilities to bring this indicator to ten billion dollars in the next five years. To this end, the parties agreed to adopt the roadmap, develop wholesale distribution centers and joint agricultural clusters.

The parties noted the importance of developing mutually beneficial partnership through the creation of new joint ventures in various sectors of the economy. Attracting investment, industrial cooperation, agro-industrial complex, transport and logistics, energy, pharmaceuticals, construction industry were identified as priority areas.

Agreements were reached on the implementation of specific projects of industrial cooperation. There are already successful examples of such interaction in mechanical engineering, energy, electrical, chemical, textile and other industries. New large projects are planned to be implemented in construction, agriculture, pharmaceuticals and other priority areas.

Following the business events held the day before, a package of promising investment projects worth over two billion dollars has been prepared.

A joint International Center for Industrial Cooperation will be established to give additional impetus to these efforts.

Interregional contacts are becoming the driver of increased interaction. Thus, following the recent Forum of Regions, several agreements and trade contracts were signed.

The heads of the border regions of the two countries were instructed to interact even more closely in matters of mutual deliveries of products and the development of new cooperation projects.

The transport sector was noted as an important area. The volume of road and rail freight traffic is growing. Air traffic between the countries has been fully restored, new directions have been opened.

The President of Uzbekistan emphasized the importance of creating new routes that provide access to the markets of each other and third countries. The leaders agreed to speed up projects for the construction of the Uchquduq – Kyzylorda railway and highway, as well as the Turkestan – Shymkent – Tashkent high-speed railway.

The issues of rational use of water resources were also considered. To this end, the parties agreed to develop sustainable long-term mechanisms for mutually beneficial cooperation and continue the work of the Joint Working Group to develop proposals in all areas of water relations between the two countries. The necessity of taking joint practical measures for the accelerated introduction of the latest water-saving technologies, the implementation of joint activities on forest planting in the Aral Sea region was noted.

The parties expressed their intention to closely cooperate in the foreign policy, promoting mutual interests and ideas of regional rapprochement to ensure peace and stability in Central Asia. The Presidents agreed to purposefully work to improve the format of the Consultative Meetings of the Heads of State of Central Asia to maximize the use of their potential with strict respect for the interests of all participating states.

Issues of building up humanitarian exchanges, cooperation in education, science, healthcare, culture and art, tourism and sports were also discussed at the meeting.

The President of Kazakhstan noted that a monument to Alisher Navoi will be erected in Nur-Sultan, as a symbol of the spiritual alliance and centuries-old friendship between the people of the two countries.

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