The results of the activities of the Foreign Ministry for 2022, current challenges and outlines of work for the upcoming period were discussed at a meeting of the collegium of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs chaired by Deputy Prime Minister – Minister of Foreign Affairs Mukhtar Tileuberdi today. Deputy Chief of Staff of the President – Special Envoy of the President of Kazakhstan for International Cooperation Yerzhan Kazykhan also took part in the work of the collegium, El.kz cites MFA.
The Foreign Minister stressed that the Ministry is geared toward further effective implementation of the Foreign Policy Concept approved by President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev in 2020. The priorities here remain ensuring security and stability along the perimeter of the country’s borders, increasing Kazakhstan’s role as a subject of regional and global politics, and protecting and ensuring national interests.
“Undoubtedly, new challenges complicate the implementation of a multi-vector foreign policy by Kazakhstan, but at the same time prove it is relevant and has no alternatives. In addition, taking timely measures to adapt to geopolitical realities, without deviating from a proactive, pragmatic and balanced foreign policy course, is becoming critical for domestic diplomacy,” the Minister said.
In turn, Special Envoy Kazykhan stressed that the President pays special attention to the work of the Foreign Ministry and expects concrete results in terms of improving the diplomatic service.
“The Foreign Ministry has been given major tasks that require selfless work from every diplomat in the interests of ensuring prosperity, strengthening security and stable development of our homeland,” he said.
At the meeting, deputy foreign ministers reported on their areas of responsibilities as well as heads of structural divisions of the Ministry and subordinate organizations delivered on the results of the work carried out for 2022 and plans for 2023.
During the collegium, a record number of international contacts of the Head of State, who made 13 foreign visits, took part in 26 international events in full-time and online formats last year, was noted. The total result of the visits is the signing of 175 documents. Under the chairmanship of the Head of State, major global events were convened – the Congress of Leaders of World and Traditional Religions with the participation of Pope Francis and other authoritative spiritual leaders, as well as the summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA), where the Astana Statement was adopted on this forum’s transformation into a full-fledged regional international organization.
At the same time, Kazakhstan’s effective participation in the UN Human Rights Council given its election for 2022-2024, the successful holding of the 12th WTO Ministerial Conference in Geneva under the chairmanship of Kazakhstan, and other actions were noted as achievements of the domestic diplomacy of the past year.
Speaking about the most important foreign policy tasks for the upcoming period and noting the full completion of the international legal definition of the state border of the Republic of Kazakhstan on the southern borders in 2022, the Minister stressed the pressing need to increase efforts to promote regional cooperation and interaction with the closest neighbours and brotherly states in Central Asia.
The Foreign Minister outlined the fundamental importance of further development of good-neighborly and mutually beneficial relations with strategic partners – Russia and China, – as well as increasing the dynamics of relations with leading powers and regional leaders – the United States, the European Union, the states of Asia, the Middle East and Transcaucasia.
Minister Tileuberdi, in the context of multilateral diplomacy, stressed the clear position of our country in support of the UN as a unique international organization. In this regard, he quoted the words of President Tokayev that “Kazakhstan will always stand for compliance with international law and the UN Charter, make active efforts to strengthen the authority of the UN as a universal and uncontested international organization.”
For the coming period, the Minister instructed to continue promoting initiatives of the President such as the establishment of the UN Regional Hub for Sustainable Development Goals for Central Asia and Afghanistan in Almaty, the creation of an International Biological Safety Agency under the auspices of the UN, as well as the proclamation of the International Year of Mobilization of Volunteers for Development in the UN. In addition, he noted the importance of ensuring the effective chairmanship of our country in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in 2023-2024 and the Organization of Turkic States (OTS) this year, including the quality organization of the 10th anniversary summit of the OTS in Turkestan this autumn.
Due to the sharp deterioration in the geopolitical situation in the world and the disruption of traditional supply chains, the urgency of the development of transit and logistics interconnectedness of Kazakhstan was identified. “Given the geographical location of Kazakhstan in the center of the Eurasian continent, the further development of the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route, and the development of the North–South corridor are of key importance for us,” Minister Tileuberdi said.
A substantive discussion about the importance of improving the mechanisms and increasing the efficiency of economic diplomacy in the face of increased competition for investment flows took place at the collegium. In this regard, the relevance of the adoption in 2022 of the Concept of Investment Policy until 2026 and the resumption of investment agreements for strategic investors developing significant investment projects in Kazakhstan in order to support foreign investors was noted.
Further, the need to continue work on the relocation of large industrial enterprises and international corporations to Kazakhstan was outlined. A list of 362 major companies from 37 countries of the world was formed. To date, there are concrete results in relation to 61 companies (21 have relocated, 12 are under study, 28 are promising companies).
Last year, according to the information of Meirzhan Yussupov, Chairman of the Board of Kazakh Invest National Company, 46 new projects with foreign participation were commissioned with the assistance of the national company. The total investment amounted to 4.1 billion US dollars into these new projects, which made it possible to create more than 6,000 new jobs. At the same time, in general, for 9 months of 2022, 22.1 billion US dollars of foreign direct investments were attracted to the country.
In this regard, the collegium considered specific ways of implementing the tasks set by the Head of State to attract at least 150 billion US dollars in the next seven years. Already in 2023, it is planned to attract 24.4 billion US dollars.
Special attention was paid to the systematic work of the consular service of the Ministry for 2022. In particular, the expansion of the list of visa-free countries up to 80 states for various categories of passports, the conclusion of mutual agreements with nine new countries, as well as the introduction of a pilot project of electronic documentation of our citizens abroad was noted.
In this regard, the Minister outlined the protection of the rights and interests of our citizens abroad and the work with qandastar (fellow countrymen abroad) as a particularly important dimension.
In this vein, during the collegium, President of the Otandastar Foundation Abzal Saparbekuly, Chairman of the Board of the KazAID Dastan Yeleukenov and Chairman of the Board of the Foreign Policy Research Institute Bolat Nurgaliyev delivered their remarks.
In conclusion, the Minister noted that, in accordance with the instructions of the Head of State given at the 2021 expanded collegium, reforms will continue in order to further modernize the diplomatic service.
Following the meeting, Minister Tileuberdi set a number of new tasks for the Foreign Ministry and gave specific instructions in all areas of the Ministry’s work.