Several Crucial Decisions Made at the Conference Attended by Over 300 Delegates Including Heads of More than 20 Parliaments and Over 60 Delegations

The 2^nd Conference of the Parliamentary Network of the Non-Aligned Movement has taken place in Manama, the capital city of the Kingdom of Bahrain, with more than 300 delegates in attendance, amongst them speakers of more than twenty parliaments and in excess of 60 delegations.

The participating delegations were welcomed by Chair of the Milli Majlis/NAM Parliamentary network Sahiba Gafarova who then opened the Conference.

There was a minute of silence in memoriam of the people killed in the earthquakes in Türkiye and Syria.

Chair of the Milli Majlis Sahiba Gafarova took the floor next.

The NAM Parliamentary Network is at the fore as one of the more substantial outcomes of the efforts made by Azerbaijan, the Movement’s Chairing State, to ensure its institutional growth, according to Mrs Gafarova who recalled the decision that the Heads of State and Government had made at the NAM Summit Meeting in Baku in October 2019 to broaden and deepen co-operation amongst the Member Parliaments. The NAM Parliamentary Network was established on the sidelines of the 143^rd IPU Assembly in November 2021 pursuant to the initiative of Ilham Aliyev, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan and Chairman of the Movement. The first Conference of the Network, participated by more than 400 delegates of eight inter-parliamentary entities and over forty parliaments, was held in Baku in June 2022. The Statute on Working Modalities of the Network and the Baku Declaration were adopted, the official logo and flag of the Network were chosen and Chair and three Vice-Chairs of the Network were elected for three-year tenures during the Baku Conference.

Remembering that she had taken part in assemblies and rallies at several platforms including the G20 Parliamentary Speakers’ Summit Meeting and the Summit Meeting of the NAM Contact Group against COVID-19 in the time since the first Conference of the NAM PN, the Speaker of the Milli Majlis emphasised in her speech in Manama that the propagation of the Network's ideas and objectives had been a common thread running through all its speeches at those important international events and all her meetings with the heads of parliament of its member parliaments, both bilateral and multilateral ones. The promotion of the values and principles of the Non-Aligned Movement through strengthening solidarity and co-operation and developing institutional dialogue with other organisations had been an equally important subject broached at those meetings. Consequently, the Network has already elaborated mechanisms of co-operation with such inter-parliamentary institutions as the Asian Parliamentary Assembly, the Arab Parliament, the OIC Parliamentary Union, the Parliamentary Assembly of Turkic States and the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly, and has also acquired the observer status in them. The work continues now to broaden those frameworks, according to Mrs Gafarova.

At the same time, the members of the Parliamentary Network Secretariat are joining the monthly meetings of the NAM states’ ambassadors, by way of information accumulation, at the UN Office in Geneva and the UN HQ in NYC. As regards bilateral co-operation, the Milli Majlis of the Republic of Azerbaijan has formed parliamentary friendship groups with the legislatures of 16 NAM Member States more, which spells out our goal of continuing the strengthening of co-operation with all the Movement parliaments.

Saying that the 2^nd Conference of the Network was dedicated to parliamentary support to the national and global efforts on post-pandemic recovery, Speaker Gafarova mentioned, a propos, the recent (2 March) Summit Meeting of the NAM Contact Group against COVID-19 held in Azerbaijan’s capital city of Baku. That was yet another proactive initiative of President Ilham Aliyev, fielded by him as the NAM Chair to ensure that resolute steps are taken regarding matters pertaining to the post-pandemic revival. Sahiba Gafarova stressed that one of the most practical outcomes of the Summit-Level Meeting was the declaration by President Aliyev of two Global Calls to support the post-pandemic recovery in Africa and Small Island Developing States. Azerbaijan as the first donor has allocated 1 million US dollars for both Global Calls in line with this initiative.

The Azerbaijani Chairmanship of the Network proposed the establishment of a Parliamentary Support Group for post-pandemic global recovery initiatives of the NAM Chairmanship seeking to secure support and promotion by parliamentary means for those two Global Calls within the NAM and globally alike, on.

‘I believe that it will ensure an input of parliamentarians in addressing the issues of concern for our countries,’ Sahiba Gafarova commented.

She went further to emphasise that the problem of neo-colonialism was another important issue requiring attention. Whilst the NAM has always been unanimous on this issue, France’s rejection of the unquestionable sovereignty of the Union of Comoros over the island of Mayotte as well as violation of the rights of the New Caledonian people and other peoples in the French overseas territories show that this dangerous tendency is, actually, on the rise. Mrs Gafarova believes that the NAM parliaments should stand firm against any act in such a disgraceful strain and combine efforts with the Member Governments to fend it off.

The 2^nd NAM PN Conference also focuses on exchanging views on further institutionalisation of the Parliamentary Network. In her speech at the Baku Conference, Mrs Gafarova said, she had emphasised that the institutional development of the Network would be an on-going process. Thus, taking into consideration the communications received from a number of Member Parliaments, the Azerbaijani Chairmanship proposed several amendments to the Statute on Working Modalities. It is believed that developing and improving working methods of the Network further is an important component of its institutional formation and effective operation.

Concluding her speech, the Chair of the Milli Majlis shared with the participants of the Conference her firm belief that the Parliamentary Network is on the way to becoming an important asset for promotion of ideals and principles of the NAM as well as of multilateralism, dialogue and interparliamentary co-operation.  

Next spoke Chairman of the Consultative Council of the Kingdom of Bahrain Ali bin Saleh Al-Saleh, President and Secretary General of the Inter-Parliamentary Union Duarte Pacheco and Martin Chungong, respectively, Speaker of the House of Representatives of the Arab Republic of Egypt Hanafy El Gebaly, Speaker of the National Assembly of Malawi Catherine Gotani Hara, Speaker of the National Assembly of the Republic of Côte d'Ivoire Adama Bictogo, Speaker of the National Assembly of Burundi Gélase Ndabirabe, Speaker of the House of Representatives of Nepal Dev Raj Ghimire, Speaker of the Republic of Fiji Naiqama Lalabalavu, President of the Plurinational Legislative Assembly of Bolivia Jerges Mercado Suárez, Speaker of the National Assembly of Tanzania Tulia Ackson and others. All those thanked Azerbaijan for the high level of organisation of the conference, brought up the successful Azerbaijani chairmanship of NAM and underlined the importance of the steps taken towards the institutional development of its Parliamentary Network. Besides, there were comments and suggestions as to the Organisation’s eventual activities and development.

The decisions ‘On Establishing the NAM PN Parliamentary Group of Support for Post-Pandemic Global Recovery Initiatives of the NAM Chairmanship’, ‘On Granting of the Observer Status to International Parliamentary Organisations in the Parliamentary Network of the Non-Aligned Movement’ and ‘On Amending the Working Modalities of the NAM PN’ as well as the Manama Declaration were passed at the Conference.

The Press and Public Relations Department
The Milli Majlis