Press release on Deputy Foreign Minister Igor Morgulov’s address to the Russia-ASEAN University Forum, Vladivostok, September 2, 2016
On September 2, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation Igor Morgulov addressed the Russia-ASEAN University Forum held on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum. Mr Morgulov conveyed the Russian Foreign Minister’s greetings to the participants of the event:
“I would like to welcome you to Vladivostok as representatives of the academic and university communities of Russia and the ASEAN countries. We are grateful to our ASEAN partners for accepting the invitation to come here. My special thanks go to the MGIMO University, the Far Eastern Federal University and other Russian universities for promoting cooperation with ASEAN countries in education, including the organising of this meeting.
“The University Forum is the first such event held as part of the Russia-ASEAN dialogue partnership. As you may know, the decision to hold it was approved at President Vladimir Putin’s meeting with the ASEAN heads of state and government in Sochi in May of this year, a meeting dedicated to the 20th anniversary of Russian-ASEAN cooperation. The Sochi summit gave a powerful impetus to building a diverse dialogue with ASEAN. For the first time in history, the leaders of these ten countries simultaneously assembled in Russia. We see this as recognition of Russia’s constructive role in the affairs of the Asia-Pacific region and in promoting security, stability and dynamic development there.
“Russian-ASEAN cooperation has become firmly established as a key foreign policy priority in our countries. Our dialogue is aimed at attaining practical results and is based on basic principles of interstate relations such as equality and mutual respect, regard for each other’s interests, and recognition of the modern world’s cultural and civilisational diversity.
“An important component of Russian-ASEAN ties is humanitarian cooperation, including education and science, university exchanges, and exchanges between research centres. We have a stake in making it consistent and inclusive. The University Forum is designed to achieve precisely this objective. We regard it as a promising venue for mobilising our countries’ remarkable intellectual potential and using it to launch comprehensive research into the main regional and global trends, come to grips with existing risks, and chart the course for the Asia Pacific region’s sustainable development.
“Our great hope is that the discussion at the forum will help fill the agenda for the Russia-ASEAN Working Group on Education, which is being created. We believe your work will be in line with the general effort to promote all-round cooperation between Russia and ASEAN and, among other things, to implement the Sochi summit’s main agreement on bringing Russia-ASEAN relations to the level of strategic partnership.
“Colleagues, I would like to add that all of us have a vested interest in the Asia Pacific region being secure, stable and prosperous and in promoting versatile interstate ties, including in education and science. I’m confident that we will be able to turn ATR into an open area of common development based on constructive mutual complementarity of various integration projects. The pledge of success is our shared intention to jointly look for solutions to existing issues via broad and equitable cooperation. We hope that the academic communities in our countries will contribute to these efforts.
“I wish the participants in the University Forum successful work and all the best.”
