SOCHI, October 11. /TASS/. The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) member-countries regret Ukraine’s absence from the CIS summit but are certain that Kiev will return to interaction with the Commonwealth some time later, CIS Executive Secretary Sergey Lebedev told reporters following CIS summit.
"Ten countries took part in the summit, nine were represented at the level of the presidents, Kyrgyzstan - at the level of the prime minister. Unfortunately, Ukraine was absent," he said.
"Of course, Ukraine’s absence is regrettable. That was noted at a meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers yesterday and [at the summit] today. However, everyone believes that this is a temporary phenomenon," Lebedev noted.
He explained that "Ukraine’s participation in the activities of the Commonwealth meets Ukraine’s interests in the first place, and other CIS member-countries are interested in that too."
Speaking about the results of the summit held in Sochi, Lebedev noted that "the conversation was frank and trust-based."
He added that his powers as the CIS Executive Secretary had been extended for two years - until December 31, 2019.
Lebedev noted that the participants in the summit discussed the inter-parliamentary cooperation within the CIS. "What is important is that Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, which earlier did not take part in the activities of the CIS inter-Parliamentary Assembly, expressed their willingness to be actively involved in the work of the CIS Parliamentary Assembly," he stressed.