Balkan countries back Kazakhstan's initiative on holding OSCE Summit in Astana in 2010 - K.Zhigalov

The Kazakh delegation included Ambassador-at-Large Dulat Kuanyshev, Kazakh Ambassador to Turkey and Albania Bagdad Amreyev, and head of the Kazakh diplomatic mission in Hungary and the states of South-Eastern Europe Rashid Ibrayev. The issues of strengthening the OSCE role and cooperation development of the region's states with the Organization were on the agenda of the 'Balkan' visit. Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Konstantin Zhigalov told our correspondent about main goals of the Kazakh delegation, the visit and its results.

The Kazakh diplomat highlighted importance of the delegation's visit to Southeastern Europe, which is one of the priority regions of the Organization's activity.

As K.Zhigalov noted, the Kazakh delegation successfully solved the tasks it has faced. There was elaborated an intensive schedule of work, within the framework of which our diplomats held several successful meetings with heads of OSCE field operations, leaders of Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina, senior government officials and parliamentarians, representatives of the local opposition, civil community and mass media.

"We are pleased with the high level of cooperation between the OSCE missions and the states of Balkan Peninsula, including vision of leaderships of Albania, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina of importance of the Organization's operations in the region", K.Zhigalov said. The Vice Minister noted that representatives of the three countries highly appraise our country's activity on the post of the OSCE chairman and back Kazakhstan's initiative on holding the OSCE Summit in Astana in 2010.