Uzbekistan will not join any military structures and intends to maintain its observer status in the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), the first deputy speaker of the Legislative Chamber of the Oliy Majlis Akmal Saidov told Fergana news agency on 17 October.
When asked whether Uzbekistan would agree to limit its sovereignty for the sake of closer cooperation with other countries, Saidov responded negatively.
“The first article of the Constitution states that Uzbekistan is a sovereign state. If we are talking about joining any paramilitary defence structures or organisations, then the answer is no, we will not allow this. We will never send our people [abroad] to carry out any military missions, including peacekeeping missions. There will be no foreign military bases on our territory,” the first vice-speaker asserted.
He also addressed Uzbekistan’s integration with the EAEU, the structure uniting five post-Soviet states: Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia. Uzbekistan obtained the observer status in December 2020. Two other observer states are Moldova and Cuba.
“I am the head of the parliamentary commission studying the possibility of Uzbekistan joining the EAEU. We thoroughly reviewed more than 1,000 different documents from this organization and concluded that it is in Uzbekistan’s interests to maintain its observer status in the EAEU,” he said.
Akmal Saidov cited Kazakhstan as an example, stating it “has gained very little from joining the EAEU”, though he added, “I cannot fully vouch for this information. Uzbekistan has core foreign policy principles, enshrined in the new version of the Constitution, and we will adhere to them.”
