PRESIDENT RECEIVES AUSTRALIAN FM

Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia /MONTSAME/ The President Ts.Elbegdorj received on Wednesday visiting our country Mr Bob Carr, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Australia. Mr Elbegdorj expressed satisfaction with the Australian FM's visit which coincides with the 40th anniversary of the diplomatic relations, and said the friendly relations have been widening in politics, economics, education and humanitarian spheres being based on common principles of international relations. He underlined an importance of ensuring the effectiveness of the mining sector in expanding of the bilateral relations and cooperation and socio-economic development. Mentioning that Mongolia is focusing great attention to the Community of Democracies (CoD) as its chair, the State Head said the CoD intends to hold a meeting at Ministerial level. The leader of Mongolia went on that, together with S.Korean President he made the "Asian Partnership for Democracy" Initiative in order to create a regional consultative mechanism. Mongolia is proud of contributing to the UN peacekeeping operations, he added. In turn, Mr Carr emphasized that the mining sector is significantly contributing to the Mongolia-Australia relations, and noted that 54 Australian companies are running business here. He said Australia plans to augment a quota of Mongolian students to study in Australia. Mr Carr also proposed supporting each other within international organizations. B.Khuder