21st century is an Asian century, says Kazakhstan President

Highlighting that Asia is on course to dominate the 21st century, Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev opened the sixth CICA summit in Astana on Thursday, stressing the fact that the future of Asia depends on the collective will to strengthen dialogue among cultures and traditions. “The forecast that the 21st century will be the century of Asia is now a reality. But the future of Asia itself depends on our collective willingness to strengthen dialogue among cultures, traditions and worldviews”, he said at Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) summit in Astana.

“This year marks the 30th anniversary of the initiative to convene this conference. Over this period, it has become a platform for multilateral cooperation and international institution of modern diplomacy. A particularly important task that we have is to achieve sustainability in international relations in the face of emerging unprecedented threats. It is critical to give a new impetus to multilateral mechanisms and to return to open dialogue,” he added in his opening remarks.

Further, outlining his priorities for the upcoming Chairmanship of CICA, the Kazakhstan President also highlighted global issues such as economic disruptions, environment and climate change. “First, the economic dimension, Disruptions in global supply chains force us to take a revised look at the formation of efficient transit-transport corridors. The environment is becoming increasingly important. Climate change is leading to natural disasters that became more unpredictable and catastrophic. In 2021, 57 million people in Asia were affected by them”, he said.

Defining the decarbonization of the economy as extremely urgent for Asia, Kazakhstan’s President said, “To address this problem, we need investments in unprecedented amounts. In a month, Egypt will host COP27. I propose to hold a High-Level Conference in 2024 in Astana on environmental issues in CICA.”