July 20, 2021 (EIRNS)\u2014Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov captured the potential world-transforming change which can be brought about, if the nations of the world join together in developing Afghanistan and the Central Asian nations, when he addressed the plenary session of the conference on \u201cCentral and South Asia: Regional Connectivity, Challenges and Opportunities\u201d in Uzbekistan on July 16.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe representative nature of this event is vivid proof of the increasing demand for a unification agenda in Eurasia and the rest of the world,\u201d he began, in thanking Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev for organizing the conference. He situated the building of connectivity between Central and South Asia within the greater project of developing the giant continent of Eurasia as one \u201cseamless, united logistical\u201d economic hub of transportation, trade, power, development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cRussia has been consistently in favor of forming the Greater Eurasian Partnership, a congregative integration contour in the entire space from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific, one that is maximally free for the movement of goods, capital, the workforce and services, and open, without exception, to all the countries of our common continent, Eurasia, and the integration unions created there, including the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations,\u201d all organizations which have displayed an interest in this initiative, Lavrov explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cImplementing this long-term project will make it possible not only to accelerate the economic development of all participants but also to create a reliable material foundation of common security, stability and prosperity.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He cited, in particular, the efforts which seek to integrate the EAEU plans and the Belt and Road project and \u201cthe North-South International Transport Corridor linking Europe, and the South Caucasus and Central Asia with the Indian Ocean coast, as well as to the Europe-West China transcontinental transport route.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn this broad context, higher connectivity between Central and South Asia is opening new vistas for the development of trade, economic and investment processes on the Eurasian continent\u2026.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This will not happen without a comprehensive settlement of the Afghanistan conflict, he argued; \u201conly direct and inclusive intra-Afghan talks with the support of international partners can lead to a lasting peace.\u201d Lavrov named three \u201ctried and tested mechanisms\u201d as key to mobilizing that support: the Shanghai Cooperation Organization-Afghanistan Contact Group, and the two known as the \u201cMoscow format\u201d and the \u201cextended Troika,\u201d the latter formed by the US, Russia, China, and Pakistan working together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When a reporter at Lavrov\u2019s discussion with the press in Tashkent asked him if he thought the U.S. had deliberately carried out its withdrawal in such a way as to cause trouble in Russia\u2019s \u201carea of geopolitical interests,\u201d Lavrov refused to take the bait. \u201cI do not believe in conspiracy theories. I heard that perhaps this hasty withdrawal was in pursuit of some kind of geopolitical goals. We should not speculate about it.\u201d Russia is \u201cnot interested in chaos\u201d in Afghanistan, and \u201cwe will continue working with the Americans in the extended Troika format, as well as with all other countries that can influence the situation in Afghanistan,\u201d he answered.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
July 20, 2021 (EIRNS)\u2014Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov captured the potential world-transforming change which can be brought about, if the nations of the world join together in developing Afghanistan and the Central Asian nations, when he addressed the plenary session of the conference on \u201cCentral and South Asia: Regional Connectivity, Challenges and Opportunities\u201d in Uzbekistan […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":77158,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[738,520,505,639,446,660,641],"tags":[842],"class_list":["post-77157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-afghanistan","category-updates-development","category-updates","category-global-diplomacy","category-updates-bri","category-russia","category-united-states","tag-lang-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=77157"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77157\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":77168,"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/77157\/revisions\/77168"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/77158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=77157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=77157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/2.schillermeet.de\/de\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=77157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}