A meeting of the Council of foreign ministers of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) will take place on 7 April in Tashkent.

A meeting of the Council of foreign ministers of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) will take place on 7 April in Tashkent.

This was reported at the briefing, held at the Ministry of foreign affairs of the Republic of Uzbekistan. Deputy minister of foreign affairs of the Republic of Uzbekistan Anvar Nasirov remarked that the ministers of foreign affairs of Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, deputy ministers of foreign affairs of Azerbaijan, Moldova and Turkmenistan will take part at the meeting of the Council. Chairman of the Executive Committee- Executive secretary of CIS Sergey Lebedev will also participate at the Council meeting.

The CIS Council of foreign ministers is a main executive body, which, based on the decisions of a meeting of CIS Council of Heads of State and Council of Heads of Government, ensure coordination of interaction of the member-states on the foreign policy issues of mutual interest. Meetings of the CIS Council of foreign ministers are a key phase in preparing for meetings of the Council of Heads of Government and the Council of Heads of State and are held twice each year. This year the meeting of the Heads of State will take place in October in Moscow, while the meeting of the Heads of Government will happen in May in Kazan and in November in Ashgabat.

The agenda of the upcoming meeting of CIS Council of foreign ministers include draft versions of 16 documents, 10 of which are to be approved for further submitting to consideration of the CIS Council of Heads of State and the Council of Heads of Government.

The draft documents under consideration involve the issues of interactions of the Commonwealth countries in foreign policy, legal, cultural-humanitarian spheres, as well as in ensuring security of the member-state and countering legalization of criminal incomes, financing terrorism and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.

The ministers also plan to exchange views on the issues of reinforcing regional security and stability, deepening trade-economic and cultural-humanitarian cooperation, as well as ensuring sustainable development of the CIS member-states. Within the framework of the Council meeting, a number of bilateral meetings of the foreign ministers of the member-states are also scheduled.

For joint preparation of the documents for ministerial meeting, a conciliation meeting of the representatives of the member-states and CIS Executive committee will take place on 6 April 2017.

Over 200 guests, including the members of the official delegations and mass media, are expected to take part in these events.