The ‘seat of war’ is the Kelyata-Southern Central Training Centre of the Ministry of Defence of Turkmenistan near the settlement Kelyata. President of Turkmenistan, Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Turkmenistan General of the Army Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov arrived to the Kelyata-Southern Central Training Centre in the early morning.

Cordially greeting the guests the Turkmen leader focused with satisfaction on the high level of Turkmen-Japanese partnership successfully maintained in a broad range of the fields including the deliveries of high-powered road-building and earth-moving machinery. Expressing belief that a regular meeting of the bilateral committee for economic co-operation would offer a powerful incentive to intensify effective collaboration Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov noted that this co-operation was regarded as of paramount importance and very promising basing on its profound potential and experience of many years as well as the large-scale reform programmes implemented in Turkmenistan.

The first official visit of President of Turkmenistan Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov to the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan has started on April 28.

Marking a new page in the history of the Turkmen-Afghan relations the Turkmen leader’s visit takes place against the background of the intergovernmental dialogue noticeably intensified and enhanced by the agreements achieved during the top-level bilateral talks last summer. During the official visit of President of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai to Ashgabat the partners reaffirmed mutual endeavours to establish fruitful co-operation meeting the interests of the region. The dialogue was continued during the leaders’ meeting at the NATO Summit in Bucharest.

Pursuing the policy of good neighbourliness and wide international co-operation from the first days of independence Turkmenistan assigns a special role in the foreign policy strategy to its southern neighbour, with whom it has the long border - over 900 kilometres as well as the centuries-old ties of friendship and fraternity of the Turkmen and the Afghan peoples.

The regular meeting of the oil and gas industry ministers of the participating countries proved the exceptionally high demand in Turkmen natural gas on world energy market and continued the talks started at the previous, 9th meeting of the Steering Committee in Ashgabat in 2007. As is known, India had officially stated its intent to collaborate in the project.

Two main items were put on the agenda of the 10th meeting: drafting the Framework agreement on construction of the transnational gas pipeline and discussing the so-called principal of agreement - the basis of the future contract.