Kazakhstan's foreign policy initiatives presented at OSCE Ministerial Council meeting

BRATISLAVA, 5-6 December 2019 — The 26th meeting of the Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE CFM) is taking place in Bratislava to discuss the chairmanship of Slovakia in 2019 and relevant issues to the international agenda.

The delegation of Kazakhstan was led by Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Roman Vassilenko. In his speech, the Kazakh diplomat underlined the relevance of the ideas and principles embodied in the only political document of the Organization adopted in the 21st century — the Astana Declaration of the 2010 OSCE Summit.

Mr. Vassilenko informed his colleagues about the transformation processes in Kazakhstan, implemented on the initiative of President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev and covering political, economic and social reforms.

Mr. Vassilenko noted the importance of continuing inclusive dialogue and the implementation of coordinated actions of the OSCE participating countries to jointly respond to and prevent conflict. In this context, it is especially significant that the year 2020 will become a landmark for the OSCE in connection with the 45th anniversary of the signing of the Helsinki Final Act, which laid the foundation for the creation of the organization and the modern architecture of European security, as well as the 10th anniversary of the adoption of the Astana Declaration.

In order to develop synergy across international organizations in countering challenges and threats in Eurasia, the initiative of First President Nursultan Nazarbayev on expanding OSCE cooperation with the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) within the framework of the Three Dialogues concept was presented during the OSCE Ministerial Council. It was noted that the OSCE and the CICA have much in common and share similar approaches to solving the complex challenges of our time, and therefore the synergy of their efforts will be mutually beneficial.

The attention of the participants was also drawn to the situation in Afghanistan. In October 2019, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan, jointly with the OSCE, successfully held a roundtable on the theme “Afghanistan and the OSCE: Fostering Opportunities for Partnership and Co-operation”, attended by high-level representatives of international and regional organizations in Nur-Sultan.

Kazakhstan shares the partners’ vision that the second economic and environmental dimension of the OSCE can be a catalyst for reducing tensions and strengthening confidence-building measures among the OSCE participating states. In this regard, Kazakhstan put forward an initiative to create an OSCE Thematic Center for Sustainable Interconnection, which will focus on analysis and research in this area and the exchange of best practices.

On the eve of the plenary meeting of the OSCE Ministerial Council, the Mr. Vassilenko took part in the traditional meeting of the foreign ministers of the member states of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), during which the parties agreed on the adoption of a number of documents at the CSTO level in the context of the common participation of six member states in the OSCE Ministerial Council.