Moldovan deputy premier chairs meeting of GUAM council of foreign ministers

Chisinau, 5 December /MOLDPRES/-Deputy Prime Minister, Foreign and European Integration Minister Natalia Gherman, in her tenure of acting chairwoman, today presided over the 24th meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers of GUAM (Organisation for Democracy and Economic Development) , held in the context of a meeting of the foreign ministers of OSCE, in Basel, Switzerland, the Foreign and European Integration Ministry’s communication and media relations service has reported.

Attending the event were Foreign Minister of Azerbaijan Elmar Mammadyarov, Georgian Foreign Minister Tamar Beruchashvili, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin, as well as GUAM Secretary General Valeri Chechelashvili.

The sides exchanged opinions about more issues on the activity of the organisation, among which cooperation of the GUAM member states within the international organisations, sectoral cooperation development, economic cooperation, collaboration with partner states, especially the USA and Japan.

As for the Ukrainian crisis, the officials highlighted the importance to observe the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine and non-admission of violating the principles of international law. At the same time, the heads of the delegations discussed issues of promoting joint draft resolutions within the United Nations General Assembly as regards the problems of frozen conflicts and cooperation between GUAM and UN. The sides adopted a decision on taking over by Ukraine of the GUAM Presidency in 2015.

The event was followed by a GUAM-USA meeting. The sides approached important issues on the cooperation agenda in the GUAM + format. At the end of the meeting, a joint declaration GUAM-USA was adopted (http://guam-organization.org/node/1669), in which the sides reconfirm their interest to further develop the high-level dialogue in the GUAM-USA format.