A German Bundestag official delegation, consisting of members of the “Germany-Central Asia” Parliamentary Group is visiting Kazakhstan. During the visit the group’s chair Eugen Schmidt, together with colleagues Thomas Bareiss, Christian Goerke and Christian Schreider were received by Kazakhstan’s State Counsellor Erlan Karin, First Deputy Prime Minister Roman Sklyar, and met with the Chairperson of the Committee on International Relations, Defense and Security of the Senate of the Parliament Askar Shakirov, DKNews.kz reports.
On 21 February, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan Roman Vassilenko also met with the representative delegation to discuss Kazakh-German relations and international issues.
In view of the upcoming election to the Mazhilis of the Parliament of Kazakhstan on 19 March, the German parliamentarians were interested to learn about our country’s large-scale program of political and social reforms to build a “Just and Fair Kazakhstan”.
The parties welcomed active political dialogue between Kazakhstan and Germany, including the upcoming visit of German Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier planned for this year. They also underlined trade and economic cooperation as the main driver of Kazakh-German relations. In 2022, bilateral trade reached 2.8 billion US dollars, which is an almost 25% increase in the volume of trade registered in 2021. Moreover, Kazakhstan continues to account for more than 80% of all German economic activity with the region of Central Asia.
In addition to traditional spheres of cooperation in investments, engineering, agriculture, transportation logistics and other sectors, Deputy Minister Vassilenko highlighted Germany’s initiative to open a Hydrogen Diplomacy Office in Astana, announced last year, as a testament to both countries’ shared goal to contribute to combating the global warming and ensuring energy security.
The delegation’s visit to Kazakhstan will continue in Almaty, where the German MPs will meet wit with the city’s Mayor Yerbolat Dossayev and tour the Kazakh-German University and the National German Drama Theatre.
