The 2nd Conference of the Non-Aligned Movement Parliamentary Network went with over 300 delegates, including heads of more than 20 national parliaments and in excess of 60 delegations under the chairmanship of Speaker of the Milli Majlis of the Azerbaijan Republic, NAM PN Chair Sahiba Gafarova, in Manama, the capital city of the Kingdom of Bahrain, on March 13, Report informs.
That conference is already a memorable event due to several fundamental decisions made at it.
The decision to establish a Parliamentary Support Group to back the initiatives that President of Azerbaijan/NAM Chairman Ilham Aliyev had put forth at the NAM anti-COVID-19 Contact Group’s Summit Meeting in Baku on March 2 this year is one of the key results of the Conference.
Motioned by the Milli Majlis and seconded by the Member Parliaments unanimously, this decision defines supporting and promoting internationally the initiatives of President Ilham Aliyev regarding the Global Calls to support the post-pandemic recovery in Africa and Small Island Developing States and regarding also the urge to the UN Secretary-General to form a High-Level UN Panel to generate post-pandemic global recovery recommendations as the principal task of the PSG that will be formed within the Parliamentary Network.
The Manama Declaration that capped the conference expresses the common stance of the Member Parliaments in regards to current challenges and opportunities for co-operation as well as the current and forthcoming operational priorities of the NAM PN.
A decision ‘On Granting of the Observer Status to International Parliamentary Organisations in the Parliamentary Network of the Non-Aligned Movement,’ too, made at the conference, has endowed such a status already on the OIC Parliamentary Union, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Economic Co-operation Organisation, the International Parliamentarians’ Congress and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Black Sea Economic Co-operation. Other inter-parliamentary forums’ interest in co-operating with the NAM PN speaks volumes of the Network’s posture in the field of international parliamentary diplomacy rising in significance.
Last, it was decided at the Conference to amend the Working Modalities of the NAM PN for it to operate more flexibly and efficiently.