Wednesday November 27, 2013
Kabul (BNA) The Acting Foreign Minister Zarar Ahmad Osmani attended the 21st Meeting of the Council of Ministers of the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) in Tehran yesterday.
Referring to the core objectives of the organization, Osmani said ECO member states had made some significant achievements since the establishment of the organization nearly three decades ago.
Osmani added there is still a great deal the organization can achieve in terms of advancing meaningful, result-oriented regional cooperation and economic integration. “Comparing the achievements with the potential and current capacities for further cooperation in our region reflects the fact that there is a long way ahead of our nations to achieve a desirable end-state that our peoples expect of us,” he said.
Osmani also said the goal of promoting regional cooperation forms a key pillar of Afghan foreign policy. “Afghanistan attaches great importance to the consolidation and expansion of regional cooperation and will spare no effort to cooperate with our neighbors and other countries in the region that geography has tied together,” he said. “In this context, we are strongly committed to use our geographic and historic position to serve as a land bridge in the Heart of Asia connecting Central Asia, South Asia and the Middle East.” “To realize this vision, despite many daunting challenges, we have been trying to develop our physical infrastructure and necessary legal frameworks to enhance Afghanistan’s potential and capacity to serve as the center of regional economic integration,” he said.
In this context, Osmani referred to the Istanbul Process, which is a “significant step towards mobilizing political will for cooperation, confidence building and promoting a culture of working together in topical areas of interest.”
Mr. Osmani also underlined the critical importance of regional countries working together to fight terrorism and religious extremism and intolerance, which impede regional cooperation. ”Our sincere cooperation is needed to destroy the sanctuaries, disrupt communication networks, dry up the financial resources, and defeat the organizational capabilities of these networks,” he said. “In our part, Afghanistan, as the prime victim of terrorism and extremism and as the forefront in the fight against this evil, is committed to continue its noble struggle against these evil phenomena in all their forms and manifestations.”
