DUSHANBE, June 9, Asia-Plus — President Emomali Rahmon has held a number of separate bilateral talks with CIS leaders on the sidelines of an informal CIS summit in St. Petersburg..
On June 6, Rahmon held bilateral meeting with the presidents of Belarus (Aleksandr Lukasheno), Turkmenistan (Gurbanguly Berdymuhammedov) and Kyrgyzstan (Kurmanbek Bakiyev). The talks focused on state and prospects of further expansion of bilateral cooperation in different fields, according to presidential press service.
On June 7, President Rahmon held bilateral meeting with his Russian counterpart, President Dmitry Medvedev.
In the course of the talks, the two exchanged views on scientific-technical cooperation and noted that that opening of branches of Moscow State University, Moscow Energy University and St. Petersburg Mining Institute would promote expansion of scientific and educational cooperation between the two countries. Rahmon and Medvedev also discussed issues related to training of military personnel for Tajikistan’s armed forces in Russia and Medvedev stressed that he will take efforts to promote expansion of cooperation between the two countries in the field of education.
Energy cooperation was a major topic of the talks of Rahmon and Medvedev. The two expressed satisfaction with a many-sided cooperation between Tajikistan and Russia in the field of energy and termed construction of the Sangtuda-1 hydropower plant as an example of constructive cooperation, presidential press service said.
Medvedev noted that the Russian side is interested in participating in construction of other hydropower facilities in Tajikistan as well as expressed hope that activity of Russia’s state-controlled gas company Gazprom on exploration of oil and gas reserves of two fields in Tajikistan will yield good results.
We will recall that Gazprom received two licenses from the Tajik government to explore oil and gas reserves. The Rengan field, located 20 kilometers from the Tajik capital, Dushanbe, has possible gas reserves of 35 billion cubic meters, and Sargazon, located in Khatlon province 150 kilometers from Dushanbe, has possible reserves of 30 billion cubic meters.
Rahmon and Medvedev also discussed cooperation between the law enforcement agencies of the two countries and highly appraised the results of their joint activities in fighting terrorism, extremism and drug trafficking.
The two also exchanged views on a number of international and regional issues, including the situation in Afghanistan and strengthening of border control measures.
Emomali Rahmon returned to Dushanbe Saturday afternoon.
