MOSCOW, November 17. /TASS/. The role of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) as coordinator of various integration initiatives should increase, the Russian President Vladimir Putin said in his article, which was published by the leading mass media of the APEC countries.

Putin noted that the strategic path lies not only in the growing number of free trade zones, but also in joint development and implementation of the best liberalization practices among all APEC members, taking into account each other’s positions and interests.

"In this respect, we should continue our course of bolstering APEC’s role as a coordinator of various integration initiatives aimed at developing in the region a common and open market, free of discrimination and bloc-based barriers," Putin said.

According to him, effective implementation of the Beijing roadmap for APEC’s contribution to establishing an Asia-Pacific free trade zone, approved in Beijing in 2014, is particularly important.

He added that realising the APEC countries’ development potential "will take more than just reaching agreement on the rules of the game for today’s trade flows."

"We need to work out common approaches to development and regulation of the emerging markets that make up the digital technology-based ‘new economy’. We need to put in place the institutions and rules that will contribute to development and create new opportunities for our countries’ businesspeople to create modern, promising products and high quality jobs," Putin said.

Putin pointed out that the creation of new free trade zones will help to create good conditions for liberalizing trade and investment flows in the Asia-Pacific region.

"At the same time however, the way the confidential fashion in which the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations were conducted is probably not the best way to facilitate sustainable growth in the Asia-Pacific region," Putin said.

The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit will be held on November 18-19 in the Philippines. The Russian President Vladimir Putin will not attend the summit, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev will represent Russia instead. According to the Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, the Russian President traditionally pays much attention to APEC summit and its agenda. Peskov noted that the evidence of that is the article written by the President focusing on APEC summit agenda and cooperation in the Asian-Pacific region in general.