Media reports say US Special Representative for Afghanistan Thomas West visited Kazakhstan’s capital, Astana, to attend the C5+1 special session on Afghanistan that took place there on July 27-28.
During the session, the five Central Asian countries and the United States discussed plans for providing humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan.
The focus of the discussion reportedly revolved around priority issues, including humanitarian support for the people of Afghanistan, economic stabilization, ensuring fair and dignified treatment for all citizens of Afghanistan, particularly women and girls, addressing security concerns, and countering narcotics production and trafficking.
The press service of Kazakhstan’s Foreign Ministry says that within the framework of this session, which was held at the site of the Kazakh Foreign Ministry, representatives of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and the United States discussed a number of issues on the provision of humanitarian assistance, the protection of human rights, international cooperation with Afghanistan, as well as ensuring security and combating terrorism.
To achieve these objectives and foster regional development, Kazakh Deputy Foreign Minister, Kairat Umarov, presented the initiative to build a United Nations Regional Center for Sustainable Development Goals for Central Asia and Afghanistan in Almaty, according to Kazakhstan’s MFA press service.
Ambassador-at-Large of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan Talgat Kaliyev, representing the Kazakh side, reportedly drew the attention of the session participants to the importance of a single agreed pragmatic approach to the issue of stabilizing the situation in Afghanistan.
Founded in 2015, C5+1 is a regional diplomatic platform for the interaction of five countries of the region (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan) with the United States in trade, economic and other areas of mutual interest.
