Dear Mr. Ban Ki-moon,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

It gives me an enormous satisfaction to welcome you, dear Secretary General, and a high-profile delegation of the United Nations Organization on the ancient and hospitable land of Uzbekistan, and express in your person a deep respect to the Organization led by You.

In Uzbekistan we know You as a prominent international statesman, active and consistent supporter of promoting the idea of a non-nuclear world, tackling the social, environmental and other global problems.

I would like to especially underscore that thanks to Your broad knowledge and rich experience of international activity, You do enjoy a deserved authority and recognition throughout the world community. This is the very reason why Uzbekistan was among the first states which unambiguously supported Your candidature to the post of UN Secretary General.

Your first visit to Central Asia and the Republic of Uzbekistan in the role of the United Nations head provides an excellent opportunity to have a closer view to the unfolding situation in the region and exchange opinions on the acute and disturbing outstanding problems.

In Uzbekistan we perceive the United Nations to be the sole universal international institution to support the global security and stability, the unique organization to address many complex interstate problems.

One can say without exaggeration that all over the world the millions of people set great hopes on the United Nations in terms of resolving contemporary threats and challenges, i.e. eliminating misery, poverty and diseases, combating drug trade and drug trafficking, countering devastating climate change on our planet, settling conflicts ongoing in many regions, searching for the ways of the soonest resolution of the ongoing financial-economic crisis and ensuring sustainable development of the world economy.

Dear Mr. Ban Ki-moon,

We highly value Your initiative to pay a personal visit to the area adjacent to the Aral Sea and thus to draw the attention of the world community to one of the global ecological catastrophes of modernity.

The Aral Sea disaster which caused huge sufferings mainly to Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan stands as one of the evidences of fatal consequences of the climate change, as well as ecological and water imbalance in the region, progressing decrease of the area of glaciers on the Pamir and Tien-Shan mountains, where the significant part of watercourses of the main rivers in the region, i.e. Amudarya and Syrdarya, are formed.

The region around the Aral Sea is being inexorably seized by ever expanding desert.

For over the past 50 years the Aral Sea water area shrunk for more than four times, the water volume decreased for ten times, and for as much as its mineralization has grown.

Both this region around the drying up sea and the territories far beyond its boundaries are located in the zone of a permanent environmental risk impacted by the factors that negatively influence the quality of life, health and the gene pool of the local population.

No doubt that it is impossible to resolve the outstanding social and economic problems of the population in the Aral Sea basin without joint efforts and close cooperation with the United Nations.

I am convinced that Your travel to the Aral Sea zone raises a great hope in the society of Uzbekistan in matters related to tackling many acute environmental and social problems.

Certainly, in the course of Your visit we will also have an opportunity to thoroughly exchange views on the issues of regional security. Uzbekistan and the United Nations have accumulated sufficient experience of constructive interaction in this sphere. Today, one of the serious problems both in terms of ensuring the regional and global security remains to be the long-standing and bloody conflict in Afghanistan.

With an aim of soonest resolution of this problem Uzbekistan has initiated creation of the Contact Group “6+3” under aegis of the United Nations, which includes the neighbors of Afghanistan, the United States, Russia and NATO. We hope for Your, Mr. Secretary General, comprehensive support of this proposal.

We believe that there is no military way of the Afghan settlement. The path to the peace lays through social and economic revival of the country, achievement of domestic consensus and accord, and creation of favorable international conditions for this aim.

For this it is necessary to address the acute problems of eliminating poverty and misery, provide for respectful treatment of all ethnic and religious groups, ancient history and culture of Afghanistan, exclude the inadmissible neglect of customs, traditions and religion of Islam professed by the local population.

Uzbekistan, as a friendly neighbor of Afghanistan, has already been rendering a broad-scale assistance to reach these objectives. In particular, our country with support of international financial institutions is implementing the projects on construction of transport communications, supplies the Afghan population electricity and transports considerable volumes of humanitarian aid.

In conclusion, I would like to emphasize that Uzbekistan and the United Nations have rather rich and perspective agenda of cooperation, and we hope for further fruitful and effective interaction.

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