ASTANA, October 13. /TASS/. The world is becoming multipolar, with Asia playing a key role and new centers of power gaining strength in the region, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA) on Thursday.

The Asian countries, he said, contribute heavily to world economic growth. Given the shift of the focus of global politics and economics towards Asia, the countries of that region should not waste time and develop the Eurasian space, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko believes. Asia must not permit greater protectionism and the introduction of new restrictions, said Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev.

TASS has summarized the key statements made at the CICA summit.

On the multipolar world

"The world is becoming truly multipolar. Asia is playing a very noticeable role, if not the key one in this process. New centers of power are getting stronger there," Putin said. Russia, together with the Asian countries, is doing its utmost to form a system of equitable and indivisible security "based on the universally recognized principles of international law and the UN Charter."

The Asian countries are the driving force of world economic growth. Russia stands for "the development and prosperity of Asia, the creation of a wide and open space for mutually beneficial trade and investment cooperation, and for the expansion and deepening of cooperative ties in various branches of the economy."

The time has come for Asia to take center stage in the world and it is important not to miss this chance. "Further expansion of the dialogue and cooperation among the CICA states is more relevant than ever," Lukashenko believes. The CSTO, SCO and CICA are capable of laying a solid foundation for the successful development of the Eurasian space.

On security in Asia

The spread of terrorism and NATO’s expansion undermine security in the region, said Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi. Tehran condemns economic terrorism and is exerting every effort to combat it.

Organizations existing in Asia do not fully use their potential for preventing conflict situations in the region, Kyrgyzstan’s President of Sadyr Japarov said. It is necessary to pay attention to the fight against terrorism, extremism and transnational crime.

The world is facing serious challenges in many areas. "Humanity is living through a period when the balance of power has changed and supply chains have been disrupted," said Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "The global security architecture must be formed on the basis of a more equitable understanding."

The security situation is deteriorating catastrophically not only in Europe but throughout the world. The West's practice of staging coups in countries and imposing sanctions is impermissible and "fraught with the risks of triggering a third world war, in which there will be no winners," Lukashenko said.

On the food crisis

Regional associations, Putin said, have to handle many acute problems, including "greater volatility of the world prices of energy, food, fertilizers, raw materials and other important goods, which leads to a deterioration in the quality of life in both developed and developing countries."

"Moreover, there is a real threat of famine and large-scale social upheavals, especially in the poorest countries," he said.

Russia calls for the removal of all artificial and illegitimate barriers to supply chains in the world. Moscow, for its part, "is exerting every effort to provide crucial products to countries in need."

On the global financial system

Russia advocates a revision of the fundamental principles of the global financial system, "which for decades allowed the self-proclaimed so-called ‘golden billion’ to keep a firm grip on all flows of capital and technology and to a large extent to live at someone else's expense," Putin said.

As a first step, it is necessary to use national currencies more actively in mutual settlements, which would help countries strengthen their financial sovereignty and deepen regional economic integration, he stressed.

On Afghanistan

Afghanistan remains one of the most acute challenges to security in the region, Putin stressed. Due to more than 20 years of US and NATO military presence and the failure of their policies, that country has been unable to independently resolve the problems associated with terrorist threats, which is well seen in the ongoing series of bloody terrorist attacks.

"To normalize the situation in Afghanistan it is necessary to jointly promote its economic recovery."

Russia calls for compensating "for the damage caused to the Afghans during the years of occupation and to unfreeze the illegally blocked Afghan assets."

Uzbekistan’s president invited the CICA countries to address the UN with an idea of creating an international high-level group on the problems of Afghanistan. It is necessary, in his opinion, to develop common approaches to interaction with the interim government of that country.

"We cannot afford a repetition of the sad experience of the past, when that country actually turned into an international terrorist hub," Mirziyoyev concluded.

On CICA

The participants supported the accession of Kuwait to the summit as a member-state of the forum and adopted a statement on the transformation of the CICA into an international organization.

In a joint statement the CICA countries confirmed the common approaches to ensuring security in the IT field. The statement mentions the need to help the developing participating in the Conference to catch up on the digital backlog.

The participants also expressed the need to help prevent the use of communication technologies for terrorist purposes.