ID :
361185
Tue, 03/24/2015 - 16:25
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UN should play central role in Afghanistan settlement issue - Mezentsev

BEIJING, March 24. /TASS/. The issue of Afghanistan’s peaceful settlement should be decided with the central role of the United Nations, Secretary General of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Dmitry Mezentsev said on Tuesday. Despite this, SCO is also ready to provide assistance to Kabul in the settlement of its fundamental problems, he added. "The settlement of the Afghan issue is possible only with the UN central and coordinating role. SCO has repeatedly raised the issue of building Afghanistan’s future by the Afghan people themselves who would take the responsibility," he said. "We have taken part in the UN Security Council discussion on the Afghan issue, also accepted the invitation of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) to attend the Vienna discussion on Afghanistan, everywhere outlining our stand," Mezentsev added. Meanwhile, the SCO head said the organisation was ready to take an active part in the destiny of the people of Afghanistan. "The organisation’s founding countries have emphasised their readiness and desire both in a multilateral format and based on the bilateral relations’ potential to provide assistance to the Afghan people," he added. Mezentsev said earlier that it was necessary to drop the simplistic and linear approach to the Afghan problem that remains one of the central problems of regional security. According to him, the fact that the leaders of the SCO member countries made a decision in Beijing in 2012 to grant the organisation’s observer status to Afghanistan omitting the partner status testifies to the fact "that the issue of a peaceful settlement in Afghanistan is of major importance for the whole region," he said. "The real assistance to economic recovery, more energetic efforts to eradicate the production of drugs and their components - are also an important factor of assistance to Afghanistan. In this regard, we attach great importance to the organisation’s anti-drug strategy," said the SCO secretary general. In addition, Mezentsev said that a meeting of the Security Council secretaries of SCO member states would be held in April 2015 to which Security Council secretaries of the observer countries will be invited for the first time. The heads of the SCO members’ drug control services will also hold a meeting. The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation was established in 2001. The SCO main goals included strengthening mutual confidence and good-neighbourly relations among the member countries; promoting effective cooperation in politics, trade and economy, science and technology, culture as well as education, energy, transportation, tourism, environmental protection and other fields; making joint efforts to maintain and ensure peace, security and stability in the region, moving towards the establishment of a new, democratic, just and rational political and economic international order. To date, SCO brings together Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The observer status in SCO has been granted to Afghanistan, India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan. Read more

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