Kazakhstan's FM holds meeting with UN Deputy Secretary-General
On the eve of the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) Global Leadership Meeting in Almaty on May 16-18 this year, First Deputy Foreign Minister of the Republic of Kazakhstan Kairat Umarov held a meeting with UN Deputy Secretary-General, UNFPA Executive Director Natalia Kanem.
The Executive Director noted the high level of interaction and coordination between the Kazakh Government and the UN Fund in improving the health of women and children, reducing maternal mortality, introducing best practices in providing perinatal palliative care, active aging programs, as well as Kazakhstan’s best practices in the development of Youth Health Centers.
The Kazakh diplomat highly valued the UNFPA activities in response to COVID-19 pandemic, including on raising awareness of COVID-19 and its impact on general population, pregnant women and newborn mothers, people with disabilities, youth, adolescents, and on prevention of violence in the families during the lockdown.
Umarov also commend the UNFPA country team’s activities in accordance with the Country program on 2021-2025, which focuses on gender-based violence, sexual and reproductive health and gender equality.
As the representative of the Foreign Ministry noted, Kazakhstan is going to announce this year the Central Asian Regional Alliance to prevent all forms of gender-based violence and harmful practices in cooperation with the relevant UN agencies such as UN-Women, UNDP and UNFPA in the framework of SpotLight Global Initiative. It is expected that Alliance will be an active platform for all stakeholders from governments and civil society to develop effective regional Road Map of Actions to eliminate this social phenomenon.
The First Deputy Minister also stressed that, while observing the negative consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic today, the global community should be prepared for new outbreaks of such viruses and, in this sense, the efforts of the UN Fund would be more relevant and timely than ever. That is why, Umarov emphasized, President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev put forward a global initiative to create an International Agency for Biological Safety, which would take on the functions of preventing such phenomenon.
Umarov also noted that Kazakhstan intends to further increase cooperation with the UN Fund, including in terms of enhancing the overall global efforts to help Afghanistan, which, in the near future, should become a solid basis for introducing best practices and experience within the walls of the UN Center in Almaty, taking into account the active efforts of the country in the implementation of the SDGs, not only at the country level, but also at the regional level.
In turn, Kanem expressed her gratitude to the Government of Kazakhstan for active work on the UN platform and relevant initiatives put forward by the Kazakh delegation.
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