The meeting of the leadership of the Turkmen foreign ministry with the delegation of the Political Office of the Taliban, held on February 6 in Ashgabat, caused a great resonance in the world media, the State News Agency of Turkmenistan reported today.
As you know, the situation in Afghanistan is one of the acute issues on the global agenda, in the solution of which such polar centers of the planet as Brussels, London, Washington, Moscow, and Beijing are participating.
Therefore, this important event, which marks another significant step towards Afghan peace, was highlighted by many national and international news outlets.
As President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov has repeatedly emphasized, Turkmenistan will continue to provide the friendly Afghan people with all-round assistance and support, implement new joint projects that will make a significant contribution to the peaceful settlement of the situation in Afghanistan, strengthening the foundations of stability and security, sustainable socio-economic development of the entire region.
In the course of constructive negotiations held in Ashgabat, energy, transport, communications and communications were named as strategically important areas of assistance to the Afghan people.
The largest projects in these areas are the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India gas pipeline, high-voltage power transmission lines and fiber-optic communication lines along the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan route, as well as railways connecting Turkmenistan with Afghanistan.
The delegation of the Taliban Political Office expressed full support for the implementation of these projects aimed at ensuring the well-being and prosperity of the Afghan people. A message about this, published on the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkmenistan, was picked up by large news aggregates, and it quickly spread in the information space.
Various publications have also supplemented it with comments, accompanying facts and background. For example, that the TAPI gas pipeline project once seemed very far from reality. And above all, due to the intra-Afghan instability, which poses a danger to the entire region.
Today we see how the political forces of Afghanistan are trying to find agreed solutions.
Agence France-Presse, in its publication on the talks in Ashgabat, mentions that a series of tweets posted by a Taliban representative after the Ashgabat meeting referred to “the security of the borders of both countries”.
The French news agency adds that Turkmenistan and Afghanistan last month ushered in a “new wave of transport, energy and communications links” that should play a role in rebuilding Afghanistan's conflict-torn economy.
“The Taliban promises to guarantee the safety of the Trans-Phagan gas pipeline,” under this heading the Eurasianet website reported on the “surprise visit” of a Taliban delegation to Turkmenistan. “We are trying to contribute to the prosperity of our people and the development of our country, ensuring the protection of all projects,” the representatives of the Movement quoted in the publication.
This meeting found an active response in the media of the TAPI member countries - Turkmen, Afghan, Pakistani and Indian, as well as neighboring countries, which testifies to the growing solidarity in such a vast region.
Another aspect is traced: the infrastructure being created will help not only connect Afghanistan with other states by transit and trade routes, but also bring closer the positions of internal political forces who have different views of the country's development in the process of joint use of national facilities.
The Killid Group, an independent Afghan group of public media, radio stations and magazines, published on the tkg.af website the views of political scientists and experts from their country under the general heading “Peace talks: a Taliban delegation visited Turkmenistan”.
Earlier, representatives of the Taliban from their political office in Qatar visited Iran and Russia, where they discussed the Afghan peace process with high-ranking officials from these countries, the article recalls.
Sites specializing in news coverage and trend analysis in the region, such as News Central Asia, also saw a good integration message in the news.
Eurasianet writes that on January 21, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan signed a historic agreement to jointly develop the long-contested Caspian gas field. “This precedent could, in the words of one experienced observer of the
Caspian energy arena, open up” the prospect of a direct gas connection between the two countries”.
The project could provide Turkmenistan with direct access to the European market, Eurasianet concludes, linking “breakthroughs on the Afghan and Caspian fronts” with opportunities for Turkmenistan to diversify supplies of "its vast gas reserves”.
But the main emphasis in numerous publications on the visit of the delegation of the Political Office of the Taliban to Ashgabat is placed on the peacekeeping role of projects initiated by President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov.
An increase in the volume of Turkmen electricity supplied to Afghanistan at a preferential tariff, the construction of railways and fiber-optic communication lines, a gas pipeline contribute not only to improving the living conditions of the Afghan people, but also create favorable opportunities for opening new industries and, as a result, many thousands of additional.
Turkmenistan also regularly sends humanitarian supplies to its southern neighbor, which include medical supplies, food, textiles, household products, etc.
In order to provide assistance to the fraternal Afghan people, on behalf of President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov, a special program on cultural and humanitarian direction has also been developed. It provides for a set of relevant measures, including the construction of social facilities by the efforts of Turkmen builders, assistance in training Afghan youth in educational institutions of Turkmenistan, etc.
Turkmenistan has already built a school, a hospital, a maternity hospital, and a mosque in Afghanistan at its own expense.
The construction of the Afghan section of the TAPI interstate energy pipeline will start soon. And at the beginning of this year, several objects of the rapidly developing border infrastructure between our countries were put into operation.
These are new fiber-optic communication lines along the Imamnazar-Akina and Serhetabat-Turgundi routes, power transmission lines from the Kerkin power plant to the Turkmen-Afghan border and a number of others. The Akina-Andhoy railway was also commissioned, from which a great socio-economic and integration effect is expected.
The implementation of another joint project to create the Afghanistan-Turkmenistan-Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey corridor (Lapis Lazuli), which will become an invaluable contribution to the revival of the Great Silk Road.
Thus, relying on the policy of positive neutrality, speaking from the standpoint of resolving the situation in a neighboring state exclusively by political and diplomatic methods, Turkmenistan is taking concrete steps aimed at restoring the Afghan economy and social infrastructure, putting forward international initiatives to strengthen global peace and security, to ensure the foundations of universal stable development.
Recall that it was neutral Turkmenistan that once acted among the main initiators of the peaceful resolution of the long-standing intra-Afghan conflict, providing its capital as a venue for several rounds of inter-Afghan negotiations.
In recent years, our country has actively come out with proposals to consolidate efforts to develop new political and diplomatic instruments in order to stabilize the situation in Afghanistan as soon as possible, in particular, to prepare a long-term program to restore the IRA economy under the auspices of the United Nations.
The Ashgabat meeting with the delegation of the Political Office of the Taliban Movement also added to the palette of the launched International Year of Peace and Trust, which was announced by the UN as an appeal to the international community at the initiative of President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov.