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The meeting was held on the sidelines of the informal summit of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation member states.

Beginning of meeting with President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Mr Rahmon, I am very happy to see you.

Today we will have an opportunity to discuss our bilateral relations ahead of the CSTO informal summit. There are many issues on our bilateral agenda, including security and economic ties, and a large volume of cooperation.

In this regard, I would like to note right at the start of our meeting that we are somewhat concerned about the fact that we saw a slight decrease in trade between our states last year. We should analyse the reasons for these unfavourable trends. I am confident that we can and will remedy the situation.

I propose that we talk about this in more detail today, see what the reasons are, identify and remove them, in order to move forward, especially as we have an excellent basis for our relations. Russia remains your main trading partner and the biggest investor in the Tajik economy.

I am sure that our mutual positions will only become stronger in the future, not just in the economy but also in the humanitarian sphere: as you know, a large number of Tajik students are studying in Russia, and there are branches of Russian universities in Tajikistan.

We have an opportunity to discuss the entire range of issues today.

President of Tajikistan Emomali Rahmon: Thank you for this meeting, Mr Putin,

Indeed, we have a great deal to discuss. First of all, we must talk about the implementation of our agreement concluded in October in Dushanbe and discuss security issues, particularly in the Central Asian region, in connection with the pull-out of the anti-terrorist coalition from Afghanistan in 2014. We are highly concerned about security.

Naturally, we will also discuss our bilateral trade and economic cooperation. There has been a decrease, and it was caused by a variety of reasons. However, we have every opportunity to increase our trade and economic cooperation.

Our humanitarian ties are on the rise. The third Russian university is opening a branch in our capital this year. We are very grateful to you for allocating a quota for our young people.

Naturally, during the CSTO summit I would like to inform our colleagues about the situation in Afghanistan, and not only in Afghanistan but in the entire Central Asian region. I would like to see Russia pay more attention not only to the central region, but also to CSTO’s southern borders.

Vladimir Putin: Good.

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