Tuesday, September 12, 2017
Kabul (BNA) Mohammad Ashraf Ghani in his official visit to Astana, capital city of Kazakhstan besides participation and delivering speech in the first summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) on Science and Technology met a number of leaders and officials of the OIC member countries.
In sideline of the summit, the country’s President met with his Turkish and Kazakh counterparts. In the meeting with Turkish President, the Turkish President pledged to make effort towards improvement of relations between Kabul and Islamabad.
According to Shah Hussain Murtazavi, spokesperson to Afghanistan President, Astana is ready to cooperate with Afghanistan in economic sector, while Ankara has shown readiness to cooperate with Afghanistan in improvement of relations between Kabul and Islamabad.
But the question is how much Ankara can play positive role in improvement of relations between Kabul and Islamabad? Turkey, which is one of powerful Islamic countries, might make efforts for improvement of relations between Afghanistan and Pakistan, but it is not clear whether Turkey’s efforts will give a positive result or not as a number of world countries have tried to persuade Pakistan for cooperation with Afghanistan for years.
In sideline of the first OIC summit on Science and Technology, President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani also met with President of Kazakhstan NurSultan Nazarbayev. In the meeting, President Ghani said that Afghanistan has deep relations with Kazakhstan and the relations would further expand. Both sides discussed mutual relations in particular expansion of transit cooperation between Afghanistan and Kazakhstan.
President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev while stressing on further transit and trade cooperation between the two countries asked for appointment of a bilateral delegation in this regard, adding that joint and overall works should be done in connection with construction of railway which could extend from Uzbekistan to Kazakhstan and China.
Both countries have reached to good developments in transit section, which can bring basic changes in the region. Nazarbayev by pointing to higher education relations between the two countries said relations between universities of the two countries could act as bridge between two countries’ nations. Kazakh President also welcomed US strategy for Afghanistan and the region and considered it as effective in improvement of situations in the region in particular Afghanistan.
Afterwards, President Mohammad Ashraf Ghani considered US strategy for Afghanistan and the region as an opportunity which should be used for the benefit of the region, adding that their priority was to maintain lasting peace in Afghanistan and were ready to hold talks with Pakistan and Taliban.
In the meeting, the country’s President asked for Kazakhstan cooperation with Afghanistan in repairing military equipment.
Trade volume between Afghanistan and Kazakhstan has reached $ 437 million.
Afghanistan chamber of commerce and industries and Kazakh traders held joint session in Kabul in early spring of the current year. Currently, trade transactions between the two countries sand at $ 400 million annually.
On the other hand, Kazakhstan has provided $ 20 million and nearly 600 tons flour and wheat as humanitarian assistance to the people and government of Afghanistan during the past three years.
It is worth mentioning that representatives of 56 OIC countries and other international and regional organizations are taking part in the first OIC summit on science and technology held in Astana, capital city of Kazakhstan.
Lailuma Noori
