President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov named the activity of the International Fund for Saving of Aral Sea as an important aspect of water diplomacy in Central Asia.The Head of Turkmenistan paid special attention to this subject in his speech at International High-Level Conference on Water Issues in Dushanbe.
President of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan Mamnun Hussein, Head of Executive Power of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan Abdulla Abdulla, the UN Under-Secretary General Liu Zhenmin, high-rank delegations from ore than 110 countries of the world, representatives of number of the UN structures, international and regional organizations, financial institutes, business circles and other have also come to the capital of Tajikistan to participate in the work of the Forum.
At present moment, Turkmenistan is the Chairman of the International Fund for Saving of Aral Sea.It formed up the Concept of the Chairmanship, which includes the number of specific measures.
It includes the development and adoption of new Programme for the support of the countries of Aral Sea basin, fulfilment of Regional Action plan for environmental protection as a single ecological programme of Central Asia countries and number of other measures.
This year, it is planned to conduct the Summit of the heads of the states founders of the Fund in Turkmenistan and we hope that certain decisions, which are vital for the improvement of the activity of the IFAS and its efficiency, would be taken by the outcomes of this meeting, Turkmen leader has said.
President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov got back to the initiative of Turkmenistan proposed at the Conference for Sustainable Development Rio+20 on elaboration of the UN special programme for Aral Sea basin and on placing of Aral range of problems in separate direction of the United Nations activity.
It is obvious that protection of the Aral cannot longer to be considered as internal regional problem.The support of the world community, new focused, integrated international approach, active and systematic participation of the UN in this work are required for its successful solution.
In this context, the Head of the State called the United Nations and Central Asia countries to support the proposal of Turkmen side and to start its realization.The UN General Assembly’s Resolution on Cooperation between the United Nations and the International Fund for Saving of Aral Sea initiated by Turkmenistan and adopted by consensus on April 18 this year is good foundation for this.