New Delhi/Astana, 13 October: Over the last three decades, Conference on Interaction and Confidence-Building Measures in Asia (CICA) forum has made commendable progress, and has played an important role in building confidence between Asian countries of large and diverse continent on a wide range of issues.
Undoubtedly Asian countries are drivers of global economic growth. Integration associations, such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and the Eurasian Economic Union, are working dynamically and effectively. The sixth CICA, chaired by Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, kicked off in Astana on Thursday with an announcement of it’s new member Kuwait.
In the opening address, Tokayev called for fresh impetus to multilateral mechanisms and a return to open dialogue. He said “the most important task” now is to achieve stability in international relations in the face of great threats.
Tokayev announced that Kuwait has joined the CICA as the 28th member state.
“I propose to adopt a draft decision on the accession of Kuwait to the CICA as a member state. I believe that there are no objections here, therefore the decision on Kuwait’s accession to the CICA as a member state is adopted. I welcome the State of Kuwait as the 28th member state,”
As one of the founding members of CICA, India along with other members had always supported CICA’s initiatives including organizing and participating in CICA activities.
During the summit, where India and Pakistan squared off on the issues of Kashmir and meaningful engagement at a regional summit in Kazakhstan on Thursday. Russia was also quick to raise it’s concern about it’s neighbouring country Afghanistan.
Addressing the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures (CICA) Summit in Astana, Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif accused the Indian government of committing atrocities in Jammu and Kashmir and said the onus for a result-oriented engagement was on New Delhi.
Lekhi, who represented India at the summit and spoke after Sharif, contended that Pakistan had again misused the CICA platform to “propagate false and malicious propaganda” against India and to distract from the focus of discussions among the grouping’s member states.
“The union territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh have been and will remain an integral part of India. Pakistan has no locus standi to comment on India’s internal affairs,” she said.
While raising concern over Afghanistan, Russian president Vladimir Putin said, “Afghanistan remains one of the biggest security challenges for our region. To normalise the situation in Afghanistan, naturally, we have to work together to help it with economic recovery. But first of all, we strongly insist on compensating for the damage caused to the Afghan people during the years of occupation and unblocking the unlawfully frozen Afghan funds.”
“We also invite all Asian countries to engage in closer cooperation with the International Counter-Terrorist Data Bank, established at Russia’s initiative.I would like to point out that Russia and China have drafted a joint statement for this summit on cooperation in ICT security. We hope that the joint statement will be approved”, President Putin said.
In the side-line of the summit, President Putin also had a bilateral meetings with Turkiye President Erdogan and Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani.
During the bilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin proposed to his Turkish counterpart Tayyip Erdogan that Moscow could export more gas via Turkey and turn it into a new supply “hub”, bidding to preserve Russia’s energy leverage over Europe.
At a meeting in Kazakhstan, Putin said Turkey offered the most reliable route to deliver gas to the European Union, and the proposed platform would allow prices to be set without politics.
Amidst all kind of displeasure, proposal and criticism at the CICA summit, the participants unanimously adopted Astana Statement on CICA transformation and CICA Leaders’ Statement on Cooperation in the field of security of and in the use of Information and Communication Technologies. The package of approved documents includes CICA Plan of Action on the Implementation of the United Nations Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy, as well as the summit’s decisions in granting the status of a CICA member state to Kuwait, on CICA presidency issues in 2022–2024 and on holding regular meetings of the Council of Heads of State and Government and the Council of Ministers. The CICA Fund Regulations have also been approved.
CICA is the largest regional intergovernmental forum in Asia for enhancing cooperation toward promoting, peace, security, and stability in Asia with 27 state members and about half the world’s population.
-Dr. M Shahid Siddiqui, Follow via Twitter @shahidsiddiqui
