Russian Embassy in Asmara

🎙 Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s opening remarks during the expanded-format talks with Deputy Prime Minister – Foreign Minister of Kazakhstan Murat Nurtleu(Astana, November 7, 2024) 💬 As always, I am delighted to find myself among our friends in Kazakhstan and to benefit from the opportunity to continue our proactive dialogue. You have just mentioned the number of times our presidents, you and I, and our allies meet every year. 🇷🇺🇰🇿 Indeed, relations between Russia and Kazakhstan have been gathering momentum. We have been working hard to prepare President Vladimir Putin’s state visit to Kazakhstan, scheduled for November 27. We are drafting several dozen documents, just as we discussed during the restricted-format meeting. We will make sure to fast-track this process to make this summit meeting as effective and results-driven as possible. Russia and Kazakhstan have made great strides in expanding their region-to-region and inter-parliamentary ties. Ufa will be hosting the XX Inter-Regional Cooperation Forum. We hope that our leaders will be able to deliver their greetings via videoconference to the regional delegates from our two countries. We are also looking forward to expanding our ties within multilateral platforms such as the #CSTO, the #EAEU, the #CIS and the #SCO. Kazakhstan has been invited to join BRICS as a partner country. It is our hope that this will add a new dimension to our contacts regarding present-day global challenges, especially as we are witnessing and living in a time of change. 📈Trade and economic cooperation has also enjoyed positive momentum. There are flagship strategic projects underway, including the effort to upgrade the Central Asia – Centre natural gas pipeline, and many other energy projects. This includes agreements on gas supplies to Uzbekistan, as well as delivering gas to connect Kazakhstan’s northeastern regions to gas distribution networks, which could potentially pave the way for launching gas deliveries to China. All these efforts are aimed at creating resilient infrastructure in a sector which serves as a key economic development driver. Cultural, humanitarian and educational ties, projects to open joint schools in Russia and Kazakhstan, as well as efforts by universities to open more branches, and the opening of Russia’s consulate in Aktau – all these undertakings will promote closer people-to-people ties, bringing those who are interested in these contacts closer together. 🤝 I am certain the Plan of Consultations and Cooperation for 2025 and 2026 that we will be signing today will make our contribution to these processes even more effective. #RussiaKazakhstan

🗓 On September 26, Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrovtook part in a working meeting of the #CSTO Foreign Ministers organised by Kazakhstan’s CSTO chairmanship on the sidelines of the high-level week of the 79th Session of the UN General Assembly. 🤝 The Ministers discussed a wide range of international and regional security issues. They stressed the need to step up coordination of actions on topical issues on the UN’s agenda between the CSTO member states on the UN platform and further promote cooperation between the CSTO and the UN. The Ministers discussed preparations for the next session of the CSTO Collective Security Council on November 28 in Astana. #UNGA79