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Kazakhstan president ratifies pact on partnership, cooperation with EU

Xinhua, March 25, 2016 Adjust font size:

Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev on Friday signed into law the agreement on expanded partnership and cooperation between Kazakhstan and the European Union (EU), the press service of the Kazakh government reported.

The new agreement expands the Kazakhstan-EU cooperation to cover a total of 29 areas and opens up new opportunities for bilateral cooperation in many fields, according to the press service.

"Implementation of the agreement will give impetus to solving the longstanidng problems in bilateral relations," Kazakh Foreign Minister Yerlan Idrisov said earlier when presenting the agreement to the parliament as a draft law.

He added that the agreement lays the legal framework for cooperation that Kazakhstan and the EU are ready to develop, such as cooperation in combatting the spread of arms of mass destruction, management of state finances and so on.

The agreement also lays strong emphasis on democracy, sustainable development as well as the trade order.

"Kazakhstan has become the first of our Central Asian partners to conclude a new generation agreement with the EU", said Frederica Mogherini, EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy in December in Astana after the signing of the agreement.

The Kazakhstan-EU agreement was signed between the two sides in December 2015. It replaces an old pact between EU and Kazakhstan signed in 1995. Endi