Moscow hosts meeting of Supreme Eurasian Economic Council

A meeting of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council with the participation of Presidents Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev of Kazakhstan, Sadyr Zhaparov of Kyrgyzstan, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan of Armenia and Chairman of the Board of the Eurasian Economic Commission Mikhail Myasnikovich, occurred on May 25, 2023 in Moscow.

The talks in the expanded format were joined, via videoconference, by President of Uzbekistan Shavkat Mirziyoyev as the head of an EAEU observer state. President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon (via videoconference) were also invited to join the talks.

Also attending the meeting were Chairman of the Executive Committee, Executive Secretary of the Commonwealth of Independent States Sergei Lebedev, and SCO Secretary-General Zhang Ming.

President of the Republic of Cuba Miguel Diaz-Canel Bermudez sent a video address to the meeting participants.

Opening the meeting of the Council, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Russia values a close partnership with all states, which is being consistently built on the principles of mutual respect and consideration of each other's interests.

According to him, cooperation within the union is going very well, the main beneficiary being Armenia, which has the highest economic growth rate, with GDP growth of 12 per cent this year.

Council participants will discuss energy and food security, technological and financial independence, elimination of regulatory and trade barriers and development of transport infrastructure.

Key talking points from the speech of the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin:

• Cooperation continues to strengthen within the EAEU, which is consistently asserting itself as one of the independent and self-sufficient centres of the emerging multipolar world.
• Our continuing efforts to build integration dictate the need to strengthen, develop and modernise the supranational tools and institutions we have created, primarily the Economic Commission, which must be able to provide quick and proper responses to changes around the world and to make professional decisions aimed at protecting our common interests and promoting mutually beneficial integration.
• The EAEU should expand relations with countries that are seeking equal and mutually beneficial partnership. I am talking about our partners in Asia, the Arab world, Africa, and Latin America. I mean cooperation with multilateral associations like the CIS, the SCO, BRICS and other associations.
• It is important to continue to form free trade areas with interested countries and, among other things, to encourage them to jointly use the international transaction infrastructure available to the five member-countries in national currencies and the digital currencies of the central banks.
• I am confident that by continuing to act as a team, we will certainly achieve new tangible results in promoting integration cooperation in the interests of our states and peoples.

Source: Meeting of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council • President of Russia