Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan will provide economic and humanitarian assistance to Kyrgyzstan, the press service of President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said.
During a telephone conversation on November 12, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev commended the current trend of bilateral cooperation in various fields.
During the discussion of the situation in Central Asia, the heads of state reached an agreement on joint efforts to ensure stability and security in the region, as well as on economic and humanitarian assistance to the Kyrgyz people.
The leaders also commended the outcomes of the SCO summit held on November 10.
Kyrgyzstan’s debt
Earlier, the acting president of Kyrgyzstan Sadyr Japarov said that it is possible to reduce the country's external debt "with own resources."
“The account was opened as a presidential fund. I think we will announce it shortly. A week ago, I instructed to find ways to repay the external debt. There are ways - you can repay the debt with your own resources. For example, the debt from China. Negotiations are needed, these are only assumptions,” Sputnik Kyrgyzstan quoted him as saying.
On his instructions, the Ministry of Finance opened a deposit account to service the external debt. All voluntary contributions and donations will go to this account.
As of August 31, 2020, Kyrgyzstan’s public debt topped US$ 4.5 billion, of which US$ 3.9 billion is external debt. At the same time, loans from the Eximbank of China account for US $ 2.1 billion (42.5%). The country's national debt stands at 64.9% of the projected GDP for the current year.
In 2020, the Kyrgyz authorities has repeatedly asked China to ease the burden of external debt on the country's budget, since the economy has suffered severely due to the coronavirus pandemic. Former President Sooronbai Jeenbekov, in a telephone conversation with Xi Jinping, also requested for an extension and relief for the payment of external debt. The last time this request was made during a recent visit to Bishkek by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in September.
