Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- On 16 November 2020, a meeting of the Senate Committee of the Oliy Majlis of the Republic of Uzbekistan on international relations, foreign economic relations, foreign investment and tourism was held. It was attended by members of the Committee, senior officials of relevant ministries and departments, members of the Youth Parliament, specialists and representatives of the media.

During the event, the draft agenda of the ninth plenary session of the Senate of the Oliy Majlis and the issues envisaged to be included in it by the Committee were preliminary discussed.

Thus, the report of the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan on the progress of the implementation within nine months of 2020 of the State Program for the implementation of the Action Strategy in the "Year of Science, Education and the Digital Economy" was considered. In particular, they discussed the implementation of tasks and instructions defined in the priority areas of the State Program in the field of foreign policy.

It was noted that in this direction, the corresponding tasks are indicated in 7 points of the State Program to be carried out during the year. During the event, it was especially noted that the Government and the responsible ministries and departments carried out certain work to ensure orders in this direction, as well as to fulfill most of the orders.

In addition, at the meeting of the Committee, the issue of sending a parliamentary request to the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan on measures taken to increase the competitiveness of the country's special economic zones (SIZ) was preliminary discussed.

Currently, there are 21 special economic zones in 13 regions of the republic. Also in these territories, about 370 projects have been implemented for a total amount of 2 billion US dollars, about 30 thousand new jobs have been created.

At the same time, during the discussion, attention was focused on factors that have a negative impact on the effectiveness of special economic zones, as well as on a number of shortcomings that are allowed in this area. Among them are inconsistencies in the legislation of this area, violation of the terms of consideration of investment projects and problems associated with engineering infrastructure and unreasonable obstacles.

The opinions of the members of the Committee, the expert group under the Committee, heads of directorates of a number of special economic zones, as well as senior officials of the relevant ministries and departments were heard on the agenda.

During the meeting, in detail and on the basis of a critical approach, the results of the parliamentary inquiry sent to the Cabinet of Ministers of the Republic of Uzbekistan on measures to ensure the protection of the rights of citizens of the Republic of Uzbekistan temporarily working in the Russian Federation were considered.

It was noted that a number of decrees and resolutions of the President and the Government of the Republic of Uzbekistan were developed and adopted in order to establish systemic control in the field of external labor migration, to improve the system of employment of our citizens on an orderly basis. Particular attention is paid to the implementation of the Decree of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan No. PP-4829 dated September 15 of this year "On measures to introduce a system of safe, orderly and legal labor migration." The importance of consistently applying the programmatic measures defined in this document in addressing problems and difficulties was noted.

The senators stressed that the mechanisms for the effective protection of the rights and interests of citizens of our country, reflected in bilateral agreements, are not fully implemented in the territory of the Russian Federation.

At the end of the discussion, appropriate recommendations were given to fully ensure the fulfillment of the tasks specified in the parliamentary request, as well as to take into account the directions in which it is necessary to carry out work.

An appropriate decision of the Committee was made on the issues discussed at the meeting.