Uzbekistan, Afghanistan hold session of joint commission on security issues

President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev and President of Afghanistan Mohammad Ashraf Ghani agreed to establish an Uzbek-Afghan joint commission on security issues in December 2017.

The commission included representatives of the Security Councils, law enforcement and security forces of the Republic of Uzbekistan and the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan.

During the meeting, the parties reviewed the state and prospects of cooperation between Uzbekistan and Afghanistan in fighting terrorism and extremism, arms trade and drug trafficking, legalizing criminal proceeds and other forms of transnational organized crime, UzA reported.

Representatives of the two countries exchanged views on issues of intensifying cooperation in the sphere of preventing and suppressing customs offenses, ensuring the security of state borders.

The importance of ensuring the security and smooth implementation of joint development projects and infrastructure projects, including the construction of the Mazar-e Sharif-Herat railway and the Surkhon-Puli-Khumri power transmission line, as well as protection of manufacturing enterprises, centers, trading houses in Kabul and Mazar-e-Sharif .

The sides paid special attention to ensuring timely implementation of the agreements in political, trade, economic, cultural and humanitarian spheres reached within the framework of the official visit of the President of Afghanistan, Mohammad Ashraf Ghani, to Uzbekistan on 4-6 December 2017.

The parties expressed readiness to expand both bilateral and multilateral cooperation in implementing joint projects in transit-transport, infrastructure, trade-economic, investment, energy and other vital spheres.

The meeting reaffirmed the close interrelationship between peace, sustainable development and security in ensuring long-term stability in Afghanistan and Central Asia. In this regard, the importance of supporting Afghanistan through increased regional cooperation and more effective use of political and diplomatic instruments to solve the Afghan problem was stressed with the aim of creating a zone of peace, cooperation and prosperity in Central Asia.

Uzbekistan and Afghanistan signed a protocol of the first meeting of the joint security commission.