TASHKENT (TCA) — The President of Russia’s Republic of Tatarstan, Rustam Minnikhanov, paid a three-day visit to Uzbekistan between September 23 and 25 with a schedule that included participation in a Tatarstan-Uzbekistan business forum and a meeting with the President of Uzbekistan, RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service reported.
Minnikhanov’s appearance at the Tatarstan-Uzbekistan business forum on September 25 was aimed at focusing on trying to foster greater trade and economic ties between the Russian republic and Tashkent.
Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev received Minnikhanov later on September 25, emphasizing the increasing collaboration of Uzbekistan with Tatarstan and other subjects of the Russian Federation as part of top-level agreements and an intergovernmental agreement on cooperation between Russian and Uzbek regions signed during Mirziyoyev’s visit to Russia in April, the press service of the Uzbek president reported.
At the meeting, Mirziyoyev and Minnikhanov discussed increasing bilateral trade between Uzbekistan and Tatarstan, and implementing joint investment projects in the oil and gas, petrochemical and chemical industries, automobile industry, machine building, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, and information technology.
Minnikhanov arrived from Kazan in Uzbekistan’s eastern city of Samarkand on September 23.
On September 24, he visited the grave of Uzbekistan’s late President Islam Karimov. Minnikhanov also traveled to Tashkent on September 24 where he met with activists from Uzbekistan’s Tar diaspora, which numbers about a half million people.
Tatarstan and Uzbekistan share a common historic, linguistic, religious, and cultural heritage.
