Mr Nina Mazay had a meeting with Mr Yoshinori Ono

      On 23 October 2009 a meeting of Ms Nina Mazay, Chairperson of the Standing Committee of the Council of the Republic of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus for Foreign Affairs and National Security, with Mr Yoshinori Ono, deputy of the House of Representatives of the National Diet of Japan, Head of the Association of Friendship and Parliamentary Links with Belarus, took place in the Council of the Republic during Mr Yoshinori Ono’s visit to Minsk on 22 — 24 October. Mr Yevgeny Smirnov, Chairperson of the Standing Committee of the Council of the Republic for Legislation and State Administration, Deputy Head of the Working Group of the National Assembly of the Republic of Belarus on Cooperation with the Parliament of Japan, and Mr Kiyoshi Matsuzaki, Charge d’Affairs ad Interim of Japan in the Republic of Belarus, also took part in the meeting.

      The sides discussed the statement of the bilateral inter-parliamentary relations and the cooperation in political, trade, economic and humanitarian spheres as well as in the sphere of culture.

      Ms Nina Mazay noted the high potential of the inter-parliamentary links of the Republic of Belarus and Japan and proposed to intensify them by exchanging visits. She underlined the interest in establishing strong contacts between the Belarusian and Japanese parliamentarians. According to her opinion the members of the Council of the Republic, who hold administrative positions in the industrial, agricultural, scientific and cultural sectors, could play a special role in the active development of relations.

      Ms Nina Mazay noted the importance of the Belarusian-Japanese cooperation within the framework of international organizations on all regional and global issues of mutual interest and expressed gratitude to Japan for the help in Chernobyl disaster aftermath mitigation and the rehabilitation of Belarusian children.

      Mr Yoshinori Ono in his turn pointed out the intensification of the Belarusian-Japanese contacts in the sphere of economy and mentioned the Credit Agreement between the Republican Unitary Enterprise
 “Svetlogorsk Production Association “Khimvolokno” and the Japan Bank for International Cooperation. He underlined the importance of further development of interaction with our country in the international arena in solving such issues as nuclear non-proliferation, fighting terrorism threat etc.

      In addition to that the sides discussed the issues related to the improvement of treaty framework of bilateral relations.