Russian deputy Foreign Minister on new Caspian states summit

The convention on the status of the Caspian Sea cannot be finally worked out without the holding of the second summit of the heads of the five Caspian states, because there are a some issues far exceeding the bounds of the experts' competence.

RIA Novosti was told about it by special representative of the President of the Russian Federation for the Caspian Sea, Deputy Foreign Minister Viktor Kalyuzhny who arrived in Ashkhabad on Monday to take part in the eleventh session of the special working group on the Caspian Sea.

Among the questions which have to be resolved at the summit he named delimitation and demilitarisation of the Caspian Sea and the passage of ships along the internal water routes of Russia.

At the meeting of special representatives of the Presidents of the five states for the Caspian Sea, which will last for two days, it is also planned to determine the date of the Foreign Ministers' meeting. Quite possible that they will gather at the end of this year and the beginning of the next one and will start preparing the Caspian Summit.

The previous, tenth, session of the working group at the level of deputy Foreign Ministers of the Caspian states (Azerbaijan , Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenia) took place on July 22-24 in Moscow.