Meeting with Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev

Right upon arrival in Samarkand for a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Belarus President Aleksandr Lukashenko went to a number of bilateral meetings. The first one was a meeting with Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, the host of the summit.

The heads of state greeted each other warmly. Virtually the entire meeting proceeded without mass media. At the very beginning Shavkat Mirziyoyev stressed he was glad to meet with Aleksandr Lukashenko in the ancient yet ever young Samarkand. The Uzbek leader shared peculiarities of the summit’s organization: “I am very pleased you have accepted the invitation and have flown here for a session of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. A lot has been accomplished. Sincerely speaking, it’s been difficult but we’ve endured everything and have done it impeccably. I am also grateful to your colleagues who supported everything. Because out of the 80 events that have been held about 50-60 ones were top-level ones. Over 40 documents were prepared. I talked to [China President] Xi Jinping for a long time today. He said the history of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization had not seen such things.”

Aleksandr Lukashenko remarked he had majored in history. “We know where civilizations originated,” he remarked. “You can compete only with Ancient China today. Ancient civilizations originated here.”

The President remarked he had visited Samarkand a long time before. “The ancientness was overwhelming,” he shared impressions of that visit.

Things look slightly different now: “You’ve made the city younger. You’ve certainly done well. All of it has been done magnificently.”

Aleksandr Lukashenko also pointed out serious accomplishments in Uzbekistan’s development in the last few years. “You’ve improved by a lot. The progress is colossal,” he stressed.