Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) -- Deputy Director of the Kazakhstan Institute for Strategic Studies Sanat Kushkumbayev, commented on the speech of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev at the SCO summit.

In his speech at the online meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the head of the Republic of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev raised the issue of maintaining the "Shanghai spirit" in the difficult conditions in which the whole world finds itself today.

Indeed, today, collective confrontation with “old” and “new” threats is the only opportunity to maintain regional security and overcome common difficulties, such as the coronavirus pandemic that has swept the entire world.

The proposals put forward by Shavkat Mirziyoyev on the creation within the framework of the organization of the mechanism of meetings of the heads of ministries and departments responsible for the fight against poverty, the formation of a "Network of Medical Institutions to Combat Epidemic Diseases", the development of the SCO Cooperation Concept in the field of telemedicine is not only necessary steps to recover from Covid-19, but also real opportunities for the development of cooperation within the SCO in areas such as medicine and social policy.

At the same time, there are a number of issues that will not "wait" for the end of the pandemic: among them the environment, the construction of transport infrastructure and industrial cooperation, the solution of the problem of Afghanistan and many other issues on the SCO agenda.

The initiatives put forward by Uzbekistan from this point of view are also extremely important and timely.