On September 22, 2020, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Turkmenistan Rashid Meredov met with the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the European Union to Turkmenistan Diego Ruiz Alonso.
During the constructive conversation, the sides exchanged views on a wide range of issues of interaction between Turkmenistan and the EU. In particular, the intensive bilateral and multilateral meetings of the parties in various venues that took place in recent months were emphasized.
As is known, in May this year, a meeting of the Deputy Foreign Ministers of the Central Asian countries took place in the format of a videoconference with the Secretary General of the European External Relations Service (EEAS) Ms. Helga Schmid, as well as online negotiations between the heads of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs of the Central Asia and the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Josep Borrell, during which the participants discussed a set of issues related to the expansion and strengthening of multilateral dialogue with the EU.
In particular, in June this year, a regular meeting within the framework of the Turkmenistan-European Union Human Rights Dialogue and the nineteenth meeting of the Turkmenistan-European Union Joint Committee were held. These meetings, during which a number of significant measures were taken to strengthen the political component of mutually beneficial partnership between Turkmenistan and the European Union, are another confirmation of the parties' commitment to diversified bilateral cooperation.
As the participants of the current meeting emphasized, there is a concrete basis for expanding and strengthening further promising dialogue. In this context, it was proposed to create a Roadmap for cooperation by the end of this year in such priority areas as energy, transport, trade and education, where there is great potential for joint implementation.
The intensification of work on overall implementation of the Preparedness and Response Plan of Turkmenistan for Acute Infectious Disease, where the main directions of joint activities on the restoration of socio-economic indicators in post pandemic period were outlined also became a separate topic of discussion.
Paying special attention on the intensification of multilateral collaboration in the area of energy, transport, trade and education, the parties reiterated the necessity of accelerating the implementation of joint plans and projects in the given spheres and hosting meetings of the representatives of relevant departments of Turkmenistan and European Commission agencies in the autumn of current year for the discussion of prospective projects and their future practical implementation.
