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CIS to go on living for decades — secretary general

Sergei Lebedev called the reasons for this

MOSCOW, April 20. /TASS/. The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) will be preserved and will live for decades, CIS Secretary General Sergey Lebedev said in an interview with TASS.

"I am convinced that the CIS will be preserved for years. There are several reasons for that," he said.

"First, we are neighboring states," he noted. "And neighbors, who are destined to live side by side, are destined to close cooperation because a state of war is unnatural in relations both between people and between states. Naturally, everyone prefers peace and good neighborliness."

According to Lebedev, relations of peace and good neighborliness facilitate progressive economic development. "And who will invest in the economy of unstable states who cannot guarantee the safety of these funds? That is why we are together. The fact that we have century-long relations of friendship, good neighborliness, kinship, which are still in place, is a kind of a guarantee that we will preserve our good neighborly relations," he stressed.

"I think that another important argument in favor of the preservation of the CIS is the fact that over the 15 years in office I have never heard any head of state or government, any foreign minister calling for the dissolution of the CIS, withdrawal from it, and so on," he noted.

On the contrary, in his words, all meetings, discussions, and talks in any format within the CIS "are aimed at preservation and development." "Boosting the efficiency - yes, correcting drawbacks in our cooperation - yes, resolving problems we have - yeas, but not the dissolution of the CIS - it has always been out of the question and I hope it will stay this way," he added.

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