Uzbekistan received the status of an observer state in the Eurasian Economic Union during the summit of the Organization on December 11 last year.

Over the past period, a Memorandum of Cooperation was signed with the Eurasian Economic Commission and a three-year Action Plan for its implementation. Uzbekistan representatives take part in various multilateral events of the EAEU. In April this year, Tashkent hosted a meeting of the EAEU Industrial Policy Council and Innoprom International Exhibition.

The current meeting of the Supreme Council, chaired by the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, was attended by the Honorary Chairman of the Council, the First President of Kazakhstan, Elbasy Nursultan Nazarbayev, Acting Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, President of the Republic of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko, President of the Kyrgyz Republic Sadyr Zhaparov, President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin, President of Cuba – an observer state to the EAEU Miguel Bermudez and Chairman of the Board of the Eurasian Economic Commission Mikhail Myasnikovich.

The agenda of the event included the current issues of practical cooperation in various sectors of the economy, as well as improving the EAEU activities.

In his speech, the President of Uzbekistan dwelt on the most important tasks, the solution of which requires coordinated approaches.

The following have been highlighted:

• significant potential for further building up trade relations, including by removing barriers and converging non-tariff trade regulation measures;
• the importance of deepening industrial collaboration between leading enterprises and regions of the countries, promoting projects in the real sector of the economy and ensuring food security with the involvement of the Eurasian Development Bank;
• solving the current issues in the transport and transit sphere and enhancing mutual preferences to increase the volume of cargo transportation.

Taking into account the stabilization of the epidemiological situation and the ongoing measures for vaccinating the population, it was proposed to resume regular air and rail links between the region’s countries.

The possibility of connecting Uzbekistan to the EAEU digital platforms on tax and customs administration, industry, labor migration and tourism is being considered. Opportunities for cooperation in several other priority areas are being studied.

President Shavkat Mirziyoyev once again emphasized the importance of achieving concrete and tangible results of the interaction of Uzbekistan with the Eurasian Economic Union as an observer state.