Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) - A meeting of a joint commission at the level of the heads of government of Russia and Uzbekistan was held in Moscow today.

Prime Minister of Uzbekistan Abdulla Aripov and Prime Minister of Russia Mikhail Mishustin headed the government delegations.

Opening the meeting, Mikhail Mishustin noted that the agenda of the meeting included key issues of bilateral cooperation and interaction. It will become an important stage in the preparation of the upcoming state visit to the Russian Federation of the President of Uzbekistan, he noted.

Mikhail Mishustin stressed that the Russian government pays special attention to strengthening the strategic partnership with the Republic of Uzbekistan. “Our cooperation is based on the principles of friendship, good neighborliness and mutual respect that unite our fraternal peoples. We are sincerely interested in taking Russian-Uzbek interaction to an even higher level. Fill it with promising joint projects and initiatives, together confront new challenges, primarily the coronavirus pandemic, protect the life and health of citizens of our states,” said the head of the Russian government.

“We welcome constructive interaction with Uzbekistan as an observer state in the EAEU. You can familiarize yourself in detail with the work of our association, with the procedure for preparing and making decisions that relate to the most important issues of economic cooperation within the union, look at the experience of creating common markets for goods, services, capital and labor - without barriers, exemptions and restrictions”, - added Mikhail Mishustin.

He expressed his conviction that full-fledged participation in the Eurasian Union will provide additional opportunities for the growth of the Uzbek economy and, of course, tangible advantages for the citizens of Uzbekistan.

“If we talk about bilateral relations, here we have good results, even despite the pandemic. Last year, mutual trade grew by more than 15% - to almost US$6 billion. In the first five months of this year, growth continued, and it also exceeded 15% - this is about US$2.5 billion. Russian exports increased by almost 12%, and imports from Uzbekistan - by about a quarter,” the Prime Minister of the Russian Federation noted.

“Deliveries of agricultural products are growing at an outstripping pace, largely due to large joint projects in the field of the agro-industrial complex. And here, the creation of agrological complexes in Uzbekistan, as well as the development of wholesale distribution centers in Russia, is of great importance. In addition, we are opening transport logistics corridors on the basis of an intergovernmental memorandum, which is signed following our meeting,” he said.

In his opinion, the countries have great opportunities for cooperation in all areas. “I believe that it is necessary to seriously expand cooperation in industry, the fuel and energy complex, including the peaceful use of nuclear energy, in medicine and education, the digital economy, in general in high technologies,” Mishustin said.

Russian business makes a significant contribution to the development of the fuel and energy complex of Uzbekistan. There are many examples. Gazprom, in particular, participates in the development of large hydrocarbon deposits. Joint construction of a new gas processing complex is underway at the Kandym group of fields. One of the leading investors is LUKOIL, which plans to spend more than US$12 billion on joint projects, in addition to the US$8 billion already invested in the development of energy facilities.

“In total, over 2,000 enterprises with Russian participation operate in Uzbekistan. We have about 600 registered companies with the participation of Uzbek business. We are discussing promising projects in the automotive industry, energy, pharmaceuticals and many other areas,” said Mikhail Mishustin.

“In early April, the first international industrial exhibition Innoprom was successfully held in Tashkent. We are preparing for the next Forum of Interregional Cooperation, which will give a start, I am sure, to new business projects,” he said.

“Russia is ready to share practical experience in many areas with Uzbekistan. Joint work is underway to improve the tax administration system. Our common goal is to help make the work of the Uzbek tax authorities more modern and efficient. And see what the colleagues have interesting. Apply the advanced software products and technologies necessary for this,” Mikhail Mishustin said.

“Of course, our countries are united by historically strong humanitarian and cultural contacts. We will continue to develop joint programs in the field of education and culture,” he said.

“We are already creating conditions for young people to have the opportunity to get an education in Russia and Uzbekistan. More than 200 scholarships have been allocated for the citizens of Uzbekistan in the current academic year. And for the next academic year, we plan to provide about 400 places,” said Mikhail Mishustin.

Abdulla Aripov, in turn, said that Uzbek-Russian cooperation is on the rise today, the dynamics of growth continues. This is based on the strategic course set by the presidents of the Republic of Uzbekistan and the Russian Federation, Shavkat Miromonovich Mirziyoyev and Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin. A high intensity of contacts at the government level is maintained. This year alone, dear Mikhail Vladimirovich, we have held three fruitful meetings.

“In turn, our ministries and departments are actively interacting, visits are organized at various levels, new promising areas of cooperation are determined. The visits to Uzbekistan by Deputy Prime Minister Aleksey Logvinovich Overchuk, Minister of Industry Denis Valentinovich Manturov, Minister of Health Mikhail Albertovich Murashko, Chairman of the Board of Russian Railways Oleg Valentinovich Belozerov, as well as other heads of ministries and departments of the Russian Federation, were productive. The other day we received a delegation of industrialists and entrepreneurs headed by the President of the Republic of Tatarstan Rustam Nurgalievich Minnikhanov, "said the head of the government of Uzbekistan.

“All these active contacts are primarily aimed at saturating the agenda of the upcoming state visit of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan to the Russian Federation. There is an intensive study of specific projects, effective holding of regular forums of regions, rectors of leading universities, mass media is being ensured, the opening of the Uzbekistan pavilion at VDNKh is being prepared, "he added.

“I am convinced that the results of the visit of the head of our state will determine new main directions for further Uzbek-Russian cooperation based on the principles of strategic partnership and alliance,” Aripov said.

“Despite the pandemic, thanks to the joint measures taken by the governments of the two countries since the beginning of this year, as already noted, positive growth rates of mutual trade have been ensured. Following the results of five months of this year, the volume of trade, as you noted, dear Mikhail Vladimirovich, has grown by 15%,” Abdulla Aripov emphasized.

“If we ensure sustainable growth in the volume of bilateral trade, we will soon be able to reach the set level of trade turnover of US$10 billion. The increase in mutual trade will be facilitated, among other things, by the signing today by the customs authorities of the two countries of agreements in the field of exchange of information on the customs value of goods, as well as a simplified customs corridor,” he added.

“I would like to emphasize that Russia is the largest investor in Uzbekistan. To date, more than US$10 billion of investments by Russian companies and banks have been used in such basic sectors of the Uzbek economy as oil and gas, mining metallurgy, energy, agriculture and others,” he said.

According to him, over the past three years, there has been a twofold growth of enterprises with the participation of Russian capital, created in Uzbekistan. In the first quarter of this year, 90 new joint Uzbek-Russian enterprises have been created in the republic. Among the successful examples of our cooperation over the past year, it is worth noting the implementation of projects to increase gas storage volumes, to modernize power plants, as well as to build industrial enterprises in the construction complex.

“Cooperation has been established with leading financial institutions of the Russian Federation, such as the state corporation VEB.RF, the Russian Export Center, Sberbank, Gazprombank and others. Credit lines of Russian banks were attracted to finance investment projects of small business and private entrepreneurship in Uzbekistan. Also successfully attracted loans at a subsidized, preferential interest rate, including in Russian rubles,” said the head of the government of Uzbekistan.

“We welcome the use of a new mechanism for financing private projects with the participation of Russian companies in Uzbekistan with the attraction of funds from the state corporation VEB.RF without sovereign guarantees of the Government on the example of a project to create an agrological complex in the Jizzakh region. We are interested in expanding the practice of using this financing mechanism for other projects with the participation of Russian companies,” the Prime Minister added.

“It seems important to us that the Russian Railways Company is interested in participating in the project for the construction of the Afghan railway corridor Mazar-i-Sharif-Kabul-Peshawar, which will form a fundamentally new model of international railway communication,” he said.

“We consider it necessary to speed up the elaboration of customs and phytosanitary authorities of the two countries on issues related to the organization of a regular block train Agroexpress on the principle of a “green corridor”, which ensures the maximum delivery time for agricultural products within no more than five days,” Aripov said.

“We are grateful for the decision to increase the number of regular flights between Uzbekistan and Russia. We propose to continue working together in this direction and to increase the number of regular flights to 14 per week on a parity basis in compliance with the necessary quarantine requirements. We also consider it expedient to gradually resume passenger railway communication between our countries in the most demanded directions,” Aripov said.

“The cultural and humanitarian sphere is an integral part of our cooperation. Our cooperation in the field of education is actively developing. Over the past four years, 9 branches of Russian universities have been opened in Uzbekistan. There are 12 of them, as you, dear Mikhail Vladimirovich, noted. It is planned to open three more branches of Russian universities this year and next academic year - St. Petersburg Mining University, VGIK and Kazan Federal University. The third interregional conference of rectors of universities of Uzbekistan and Russia was held in Bukhara on 26 May. 23 memorandums and agreements on cooperation were signed. The joint educational project "Class!" Is being successfully implemented on the organization of teaching the Russian language in secondary schools,” he stressed.

According to him, from the beginning of the new academic year, we expect the arrival of another 200 specialists-teachers in Uzbekistan. He thanked the Government of the Russian Federation for the increase in student quotas allocated in a targeted manner for Uzbekistan.

“We highly appreciate the support of the leadership of the Russian Federation in resolving issues related to labor migrants in Russia. We were pleased with the decision to extend until September 30 of this year the period of temporary stay of foreign citizens and stateless persons in the territory of the Russian Federation. We welcome the signing of an intergovernmental agreement providing for an increase in the period of stay of citizens of the Republic of Uzbekistan on the territory of the Russian Federation without registration from 7 to 15 days,” he said.

“I would like to assure you of our readiness to provide all the necessary support to Russian partners in the implementation of joint projects on the territory of Uzbekistan. I am convinced that by combining efforts, we will achieve our goals,” said the head of the government of Uzbekistan.