EAPC Security Forum opens in Astana Wednesday.

24/6 Tass 11

ALMATY, June 24 (Itar-Tass) - Issues of regional and global security,
the situation in the Caucasus and Afghanistan will top the agenda of the
third Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council Security Forum that opens in
Astana, Kazakhstan, on Wednesday.

Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev initiated the forum and his idea
was supported by the EAPC, Foreign Ministry spokesman Yerzhan Ashikbayev
told Itar-Tass.
The current security forum is held for the first time on the CIS space
and the Asian continent. Delegates from 50 member-states of the EAPC and
NATO will gather in the Kazakh capital.
NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer will chair the forum. He
is expected to meet with Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, foreign
and defence ministries.
Later in the day EAPC countries' representatives will be attending a
working dinner. The opening of a plenary session is scheduled for June 25.
It will be followed by working groups.
Kazakhstan's cooperation with NATO began in 1992, when the republic
joined the North Atlantic Cooperation Council that in five years was
transformed into the Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council. In 1994 the
republic joined NATO's Partenrship for Peace Program. At present,
Kazakhstan is the only country in Central Asia, with which NATO is
building relations within the framework of the Individual Partnership
Action Plan.
Russia will be represented at the forum by First Deputy Foreign
Minister Andrei Denisov.