The CSTO PA Council expressed concern of the high level of military activities in Afghanistan, especially in its northern provinces, against the background of the withdrawal of international troops from the country.
“The Council […] calls on all Afghan ethnic groups and political forces to create favorable conditions for promotion of peace process and building Afghanistan as an independent and neutral state,” the document says.
The Council also condemned the terrorist attacks in Afghanistan, as there are a lot of victims among civilians, and emphasized that the activities of ISIS and other international terrorist groups were one of the key components of the instability in the IRA.
The parliamentarians expressed concern about the extremely high level of drug production in Afghanistan, which was one of the main sources of income for terrorist groups in the IRA, and called on the authorities of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, including the National Assembly of Afghanistan, to strengthen efforts to confront the scourge.
“We call on the international community, including national parliaments and international parliamentary organizations, to increase humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan to stem outflows of Afghan refugees into neighboring countries,” the statement said.
According to the document, the meeting participants expressed their readiness to support the National Assembly of Afghanistan through diplomatic means in advancing the process of national reconciliation to end the war in the shortest possible time and stabilize the situation in Afghanistan.
“The Council […] confirms its readiness to promote the improvement and harmonization of the IRA's legislation in the field of combating terrorism and drug trafficking, based on the rule-making experience of the Assembly, including the developed model laws and recommendations,” the document says.
The CSTO PA Chairman,
Chairman of the State Duma Viacheslav Volodin
Vyacheslav Victorovich
The Chairman of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation of the eighth convocation. Elected in single mandate constituency № 163 (Saratov constituency - Saratov Oblast)
said: “We are in the CSTO member
state, which has a huge border with Afghanistan — 1400 km. All those things are
taking place close to the border of Tajikistan and Afghanistan. There are fightings.
If this statement is not accepted or postponed, tomorrow there will be a lot of refugees, and we will be like those ostriches with their heads in the sand. We
should not remain silent in this situation.”
The CSTO PA Council meeting was held on July 1 in Dushanbe.
The previous meeting of the Council of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Collective Security Treaty Organization was held on 30 November 2020 via videoconference. The meeting participants discussed issues of further approximation and harmonization of national legislations of the CSTO member states. The remote format was chosen in accordance with the current measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
The CSTO member states are: Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, the Kyrgyz Republic and the Russian Federation. House of Representatives of the People of the National Assembly of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Union of Belarus and Russia and the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia are the Organization’s observers.
