Official Statements:

Address by Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan Dr. Marat Tazhin at the presentation of the EU Strategy for Central Asia (Berlin, June 30, 2007)

Minister Steinmeier,

Minister Amado,

Ambassador Morel, Director General Landaburu,

Dear colleagues,

First of all, allow me to congratulate our European partners on the positive outcome of the EU Brussels Summit, where crucial decisions were made. German saying goes ‘Eintracht das Kleine mehrt, Zwietracht das Große verheert’ [‘Айнтрахт дас кляйнэ меерт, Цвитрахт дас гросэ ферхеерт’] or ‘Unity enlarges the small and division destructs the large’ (Единодушие увеличивает малое, несогласие разрушает большое) – so the EU was equally united in adopting an unprecedented Strategy towards Central Asia, which is officially presented here by the German Presidency – so ‘Astana Process’ became Berlin’s ‘Success’.

Let me congratulate Minister Steinmeier and his colleagues on a job well done and to express our sincere hope that Portuguese Presidency and personally Minister Amado will be just as successful in promotion of our inter-regional dialogue.

We are confident that German design and Portuguese navigation will ensure that our ship will reach its destination safely and on time. We pin our hopes on the EU Special Representative for Central Asia Ambassador Morel – who as a captain has clear ‘sea charts’ in front of him and the European Commission heads and stuff who will actually carry out on a daily basis the realization of the Strategy.

We welcome the new vision, which combines EU assistance with long-term strategy and provides for balance between regional and bilateral approaches. This was the point Kazakhstan made during the meeting in Astana this March.

Mr. Chairman,

Availing of this opportunity I would like to make several comments on the Strategy.

Cooperation on security matters must not be confined to rehabilitation of Afghanistan, fight against illicit migration and other threats such as drug trafficking. We have seen a good institutional development as BOMCA/CADAP initiative and the creation of CARICC Office in Almaty.

As an advocate of global interethnic and inter-religious dialogue Kazakhstan is delighted to see that the Strategy puts special reference on the facilitation of the dialogue between the East and the West. Let me also refer to the Ministerial level forum ‘Islam and the Western world’ that we plan to host in Kazakhstan in 2008.

In energy security we are united by the common interest in diversifying export routes, demand and supply structures and energy sources. It is also important to ensure the implementation of equal partnership principle meaning an equal access for both the European investors to Central Asia and Central Asian investors to the European energy infrastructure. Kazakhstan is interested in building up its presence in the EU oil and gas processing and distribution market. Ultimately, it will be the consumers of both regions that will benefit from elimination of barriers.

We support the Strategy’s environmental priorities. Trans-border water management issues remain by far the most acute for our region, hampering both region’s sustainable development and economic integration. We should also concentrate on the issues of the Caspian and Aral seas as well as a number of the trans-border rivers.

We support the EU plans to encourage liberal market reforms to gradually align regional economies. We continue to believe that the idea of creation of regional clusters in agriculture, transport and logistics, construction, metallurgy, tourism, chemicals and textile possesses great potential.

The key to all of all this is education and creation of the electronic Silk Road where the EU could play crucial role in bringing the European standards into life in Central Asia.

Complete implementation of the Strategy as well as efficient cooperation between our regions requires active regional integration which Kazakhstan is widely known to promote consistently. We all proceed from the understanding that only strong regional cooperation can effectively solve national interweaving interests.

We look forward to see our region to be in the scope of the European Neighborhood Policy. We would also welcome broadening of the mandates of the European Investment Bank and the European Investment Fund to include our region in their portfolios.

It seems, that the authors of the Strategy also remembered Portuguese proverb ‘Cada um sabe onde o sapato aperta’ [‘Када у(м) сабэ онджэ у сапато апеғ(p)та’] – indeed, ‘Only the wearer knows where the shoe pinches’ and recognized the need for local interests of Central Asian states to be considered in the process of identification of projects and programs to be implemented there.

Dear Colleagues,

I would like to express our full support to the main guidelines of cooperation set forth in the Strategy. In my opinion, I think my colleagues will share it, further development of cooperation within the framework of the Strategy will create the content, which all parties are interested in.

The new EU Strategy towards Central Asia is a very timely instrument. To make it of practical importance we need to elaborate a number of target-oriented “road maps” and define a list of priority projects. To this end, we propose to expand the framework of the dialogue to put regular high-level meetings in specific areas into practice.

The continuity of the EU policies in our region will be ensured by the Portuguese Presidency – Lisbon has already nominated its special representative to our region. In our turn, we support the Portuguese proposal to hold a special “EU Troika – Central Asia” Ministerial meeting on September 25-26, 2007 in New-York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.

Dear Colleagues,

Kazakhstan’s priorities as the aspiring OSCE Chair are in tune with the key provisions of the EU Strategy towards Central Asia. We possess sufficient resources and experience for effective leadership in the Organization and are ready to make solid contribution into strengthening and adaptation of the OSCE to the current challenges.

The Republic of Kazakhstan reconfirms its intention to run for the OSCE Chairmanship in 2009. The latest constitutional reform in Kazakhstan is fully in line with our commitments under the Brussels Ministerial arrangements.

In this regard I would like to brief you about the core of the ongoing political changes – more power is vested into the Parliament and significant decentralization increases the role of local governance, political parties gain additional opportunities – from introduction of proportional system of voting at the elections to state’s financing of the parties represented in the Parliament.

The international observers will witness this very soon – we invited ODIHR to send its election monitoring mission for the elections into the Mazhilis of the Parliament of Kazakhstan on the 18th of August.

Albert Einstein once explained his theory of relativity in simple terms by saying that ‘one needs to imagine that instead of the train stopping in Zurich, Zurich stops next to the train’. We are confident that everyone here understands Einstein’s concepts and can make the next logical step forward. Both those ‘in Zurich’ and those ‘on the train’ need to work together to achieve our common goals. Kazakhstan is an ideal candidate for the OSCE Chairmanship being a Eurasian country and having a proven track-record of democratic progress.

At the end of the day, Europe and Central Asia are just geographical concepts – what is important is that we understand each other as fellow human beings and manage to cross boundaries just as this new EU Strategy towards our region does. Once again – we welcome it here today and stand ready to make it a reality.

Thank you for your attention.

Date of issue: 2007-06-30