Saudi will host the eighteenth consultative meeting of the leaders of the GCC and the Gulf summit with Central Asian countries, in the presence of leaders and representatives of the six GCC countries, and the leaders of the five Central Asian countries: Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.
The eighteenth consultative meeting of the leaders of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries deals with enhancing integration and joint Gulf cooperation.
The meeting is the first in eight months after the 43rd Gulf Summit held in Riyadh in December 2022.
The General Secretariat of the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf explained that the first Gulf summit with the Central Asian countries aims to strengthen the relations of the GCC countries with Asian countries based on the principles and objectives of the Cooperation Council stipulated in the 1981 statute, in addition to creating a kind of partnership and developing mechanisms to ensure the sustainability of consultation and dialogue, and cooperation in the areas approved by the action plan.
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The Gulf summit with the five Central Asian countries is scheduled to address issues of joint cooperation, especially in the fields of trade and investment, energy, education, scientific research, industry, agriculture, tourism, and culture, in addition to discussing a number of regional and international issues of common interest.
On this occasion, the Saudi Minister of Investment Khalid bin Abdulaziz Al-Falih, confirmed that this summit confirms the leading position enjoyed by Saudi at the regional, continental, and global levels. He expressed optimism about the expected results of this summit, especially with regard to the development and expansion of economic and investment relations between the countries participating in the summit, whether bilaterally or regionally.
Al-Falih stressed that there are several reasons for this optimism, which enhances opportunities for cooperation between these countries to develop their bilateral investment relations.
He explained that there are historical, cultural, social, and economic relations and links as well that bring together the Arab Gulf countries and Central Asian countries, as the two regions represented an important part of the global trade routes, pointing out that the Kingdom has relations between it and these countries that have acquired a deep religious character during the past fourteen centuries, which strengthened the depth of the Kingdom’s relations with this part of the world.
He added that the Arab Gulf countries have strategic development plans, foremost of which is the Kingdom’s Vision 2030, but also includes Oman’s Vision 2040, Bahrain’s Economic Vision 2030, and others, and on the other hand, Central Asian countries have adopted similar development visions, including the National Development Strategy for the period from 2018 to 2040 in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan’s Strategy 2050, and others.
The Minister of Investment saw that these visions and these strategies, although they differ in their details, indicate that their main orientations are close and even similar, especially in the economic and investment field, pointing out that the process of investment cooperation between the Kingdom and the Central Asian countries has already begun, but the hope and ambition is greater, and the work to reach it is continuous and serious.
He pointed out that there is a tangible presence of various investments of the Kingdom in some Central Asian countries, referring to the investments by the Saudi energy company “ACWA Power”, which has the most prominent presence in the Central Asian region, through its projects in renewable energy, to exploit solar and wind energy and build energy storage batteries, in the republics of Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, as well as agreements and memorandums of understanding signed by Dr. Sulaiman Al-Habib Medical Group to invest in the health sector in Uzbekistan, as well as the investments by Fawaz Al-Hokair Group in the field of tourism in the Republic of Kazakhstan, the efforts of “flynas” in opening airlines between the Kingdom and some Central Asian republics, and the investment plans of Al Rajhi International Group in the agricultural sector in Uzbekistan.
He pointed out that the Ministry of Investment, in cooperation with many partners in the public and private sectors in the Kingdom, is working to search for distinguished investment opportunities, present them to investors from the Central Asian Republic, and provide an attractive, stimulating and safe investment environment, based on the Kingdom’s special advantages, as the Kingdom enjoys a strategic geographical location linking three continents, overlooking the most important water crossings, and the availability of energy resources, and young human competencies, and it is the largest economy in the Middle East, and one of the twenty largest global economies, It is also the strongest market in the region.
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