Friday, 23 May 2008
Today a session of the CIS Council of Heads of Government was held in the capital of Belarus Minsk as attended by RA Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan.
Prior to the session, President of Belarus Alexander Lukashenko welcomed the heads of government. The Belarusian President expressed confidence that the COHG session would promote qualitative improvements in multilateral cooperation. He emphasized the importance of active measures towards his goal, new effective proposals for taking into effect of all developed ideas. According to Alexander Lukashenko, the further development of the Commonwealth of Independent States is largely dependant on the ability to listen to each other, find solutions to the challenges faced, make a shift from words to concrete action, be ready to consistently comply with the obligations assumed. The president of Belarus further noted that the further development of the CIS will also promote the further development of economy of CIS-member States and increase the living standards of the population.
The session was opened by Yulia Timoshenko, Prime Minister of Ukraine which chairs the Council. Having emphasized that as a basis for the maintenance of the well-being of CIS-member States
' populations, the activation of the economic component of cooperation has been specified as one of priority directions at the last October summit of Heads of CIS-member States, she expressed opinion that those decisions to be passed at this session of the CIS Council of Heads of Government would contribute to the further development of CIS countries in various spheres.In his address to the participants, Prime Minister of Belarus Sergey Sidorsky emphasized the need for increasing the economic competitiveness of CIS-member States, higher level of exports and investments, the focus upon the innovative way of development. He noted that the Belarusian side considered the session as an important step on the way to maintaining stability in the activities of the Commonwealth. Sergey Sidorsky also expressed confidence that the decisions adopted will promote the strengthening of trade and economic relations between CIS-member States and prepare a basis for the further development of cooperation in different fields.
Then within the framework of the agenda of session, the heads of government discussed about two tens of questions concerning the CIS-member States
' cooperation in various spheres. In particular, the prime ministers passed decisions on development of the draft strategy for economic development of CIS-member States, the course of performance of the assignments given at the CIS Council of Heads of State of October 5, 2007 and the CIS Council of Heads of Government of November 22, 2007, the proposals in sphere of coordinated transport policy of CIS-member States and preparation of a complex of joint efforts on increase of food safety of the state-participants CIS, on the draft convention on frontier cooperation of CIS-member States. They signed the cooperation agreement on the professional training, improvement of professional skills and retraining of experts in the field of hydrometeorology. A legal decision on the course of preparation of draft convention on the legal status of workers - migrants and members of their families of CIS-member States, as well as decisions concerning to development of cooperation of CIS countries in the transport sector, in particular, on measures for maintenance of updating, modernization and repair of the common park of freight cars, the concept on increase of operational reliability of bridge constructions on CIS-member States' highways in 2008
