Turkmenistan marks 20th anniversary of Permanent Neutrality

Coming back to history, on 12th December 1995, the United Nations General Assembly unanimously adopted Resolution A/50/80, recognizing and supporting the permanent neutrality of Turkmenistan. This was a unique achievement in the foreign policy of the Government, becausenot only did Turkmenistan make a strategic decision to adopt the status of permanent neutrality, the country also made a public commitment to build harmonious relations with theneighbours and to promote international peace and security in the world.
The model had been chosen and called positive neutrality and formulated its fundamental principles: peacefulness, non-interference in the affairs of other nations, respect for their sovereignty and territorial integrity, non-participation in international military organizations and treaties.

What dictated this choice? Of course, first and foremost, it was guided by national interests. Turkmenistan which became independent after the collapse of Soviet Union wanted to live in peace and harmony with its neighbours, maintain friendly and equal relations with all countries, develop mutually beneficial economic, trade contacts with them. Turkmenistan believed that only under these conditions peace and cohesion could be guaranteed to Turkmen people and economic and social development plans could be implemented. Neutrality became the optimal model to implement these plans and goals, a form in which the content of the Turkmen foreign policy was built in most harmoniously and natural. Our country started to pursue consistently the sovereign, neutral and at the same time active and constructive foreign policy.

Concrete steps have followed, including the building of a close partnership with the United Nationsand taking active part for resolving the conflicts in the region. Turkmenistan within the years has taken an active part in the peaceful revival of neighbouring Afghanistan contributing to its social and economic development. The fruitful partnership between the regional states in the energy and transport spheres promotes the interests of peace and progress. For example, that is vividly proved by a large energy project ? construction of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India gas pipeline project. Speaking about the historical importance of this large-scale pipeline, which annual capacity makes up more than 30 billion cubic meters of gas, it is necessary to underline that the implementation of this project would contribute to strengthening peace, sustainable development and building up cooperation in the Asian region. In December 2007 in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan was established the United Nations Regional Centre for Preventive Diplomacy for Central Asia (UNRCCA), to assist and support the five countries of Central Asia -- Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan -- build their conflict prevention capacities through enhanced dialogue, confidence-building measures and genuine partnership in order to respond to existing threats and emerging challenges in the region. One of the last initiatives to establish the United Nations Regional Centre for Disarmament in Asia was proposed by the President of Turkmenistan during the talks with Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon on June, 13th, 2015 in Ashgabat.

On June 3, 2015 at the 69th session of UN was unanimously adopted the Resolution “Permanent Neutrality of Turkmenistan”. The Assembly as in 1995 reiterated its support for the status of permanent neutrality declared by Turkmenistan and called once again on United Nations Member States to respect and support that status as well as the country’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity. It also welcomed the decision of the Government to declare 2015 the Year of Neutrality and Peace and to host an international conference on the theme “Policy of neutrality: international cooperation for peace, security and development”, in December 2015. It is not surprising that the efforts to secure neutrality of Turkmenistan as an international legal status met with benevolence and understanding all over the world.
Today, Turkmenistan expresses profound gratitude to the countries-co-sponsors of the Resolution, all members of the international community, international organizations for providing support to Turkmenistan. The Republic of Korea is among of those statessupporting the neutral status of Turkmenistan. Diplomatic ties between Turkmenistan and Republic of Korea were established in February 1992. For 23 years Turkmenistan and Republic of Korea have been developing their fruitful cooperation. Since then reached agreements and arrangements have been successfully realized in many spheres. On the international arena, Turkmenistan and Republic of Korea render mutual support and confidence to each other, particularly within the framework of interaction in the United Nations Organization. So, in December 2008, Republic of Korea rendered to our country an active support as co-sponsor of international initiative of the President of Turkmenistan on adoption of Resolution of the UN General Assembly on reliable and safe transit of energy bearers to the world markets.

Recently on April, 2015 President of Turkmenistan paid state visit to Republic of Korea and also participated in VII World Water Forum held in Daegu. The leaders of the two states held the one-to-one talks and the talks with participation of the government delegations at Cheong WaDae Palace. In his speech, President of Turkmenistan noted that strengthening the confidence building measures in Asia and creating an enabling political environment to promote relations between states in accordance with the recognized norms of international law and the Charter of the United Nations were the key aspects of the dialogue between Turkmenistan and the Republic of Korea.It was noted that the proposals put forward by our countries to further promote international cooperation were mutually reinforcing. For example, the Eurasian Initiative and the Silk Road Express Project announced by President of Republic of Korea Park Geun-hye to build reliable energy and transport corridors on the continent in many ways coincide with Turkmenistan’s international initiatives for achieving energy and transport security.