MINSK, 30 July (BelTA) – The 1st Forum of Regions of Belarus and Uzbekistan creates prerequisites for specific projects, Chairman of the Council of the Republic Mikhail Myasnikovich said as he met with First Deputy Chairman of the Senate of Oliy Majlis of Uzbekistan Sadiq Safaev, BelTA has learned.
“The dialogue between our states has considerably intensified at the top and highest level in recent years. Indeed, new interesting projects emerge and are expected to contribute to our multilateral cooperation. It is clear that the 1st Forum of Regions is largely institutional but it paves the way to specific projects, contracts, and agreements, both at the level of entities, regions and industries,” Mikhail Myasnikovich noted.
According to him, the panel discussions yesterday saw intense and fruitful work. “We want the forum to really spur the development of our bilateral relations, and I think we are going the right way. Live communication is always useful. We are open to discussing all issues, economic, political, and parliamentary contacts, specific areas: medicine, agriculture, information technologies. We are ready to share new knowledge in the areas and fields of activity of interest to you,” the chairman of the Council of the Republic.
Mikhail Myasnikovich stressed that the two countries should move towards establishing joint companies. “Joint companies is not only a new added value. This is new knowledge, access to information, which is very important. We are ready to work under the full technological cycle. We need to pay more attention to educational programs, to involve young people in this process. We, for example, in Belarus attach great importance to university education and also to vocational training. I suggest we discuss mixed programs, with Uzbekistan hosting students in the first and second years under the well-coordinated curricula and then they will come to Belarus to finish the program and get a European-style diploma. Let's take internships, student and scientific exchanges under parliamentary control,” the speaker noted.
According to First Deputy Chairman of the Senate of Oliy Majlis Sadiq Safaev, Uzbekistan attaches great importance to bilateral cooperation with Belarus. “It happened so that for many years we were unable to find any common ground. But our new president attaches great importance to the development of the political dialogue, economic cooperation, cultural and humanitarian ties, military and technical partnership with Belarus. A big step towards a new phase in our bilateral relations was made during the visit of the Belarusian president to Uzbekistan in September 2018. The visit opened new horizons for our comprehensive cooperation,” he said.
Sadiq Safaev stressed that there is a need to set up a joint inter-parliamentary commission. “We are interested in harmonizing the legal frameworks of our bilateral relations, sharing legislative and lawmaking practices, developing a local parliamentary system. I would like to confirm the invitation to you to visit Uzbekistan next year. We are having parliamentary elections this year. We hope that our colleagues from Belarus will take part in their observation both as part of the CIS mission and in the bilateral format. Your opinion is of great importance for us,” he said.
The first deputy chairman of the Senate of Oliy Majlis of Uzbekistan described the Forum of Regions a platform for direct dialogue. “The heads of all three panel discussions updated me on the results achieved on 29 July. The main thing is that direct ties have been established. I think that the next Forum of Regions, which we will be happy to host in Uzbekistan, will be held at an even higher level,” he said.
