Dear Heads and members of delegations,
I sincerely welcome you to Turkmenistan and would like to express my deep gratitude for your active participation in the International Forum of Peace and Trust, which brought together on its platform the leaders and representatives of many countries of the world, reputable international organizations, politicians, diplomats and public figures.
The level of representation at this important political event is a clear evidence of respect and trust for Turkmenistan, recognition of its constructive role in international politics, contribution to the preservation and strengthening of universal peace and security.
The current Forum covers a wide range of issues related to strengthening stability, ensuring the progressive and sustainable development of the world’s States, considering a number of social and humanitarian measures, as well as other issues on the global agenda today.
Dear participants!
During 2025, within the framework of the International Year of Peace and Trust, Turkmenistan, together with partners from other countries, multilateral associations and institutions, carried out purposeful constructive foreign policy work. It was conducted at various levels in a regional and international format and was united by a common goal – to create conditions for the effective development of international relations in a positive direction, restore trust in world politics, and establish a culture of respectful dialogue. These principles and goals look especially relevant today.
Naturally, given the existence of various approaches to many aspects of the world order, Turkmenistan’s initiative to proclaim 2025 the International Year of Peace and Trust and the Resolution of the UN General Assembly has become a major landmark event on the modern agenda, and has been highly appreciated by the UN Member states, the entire world community, political and diplomatic circles, including the consciousness of people involved in decision-making in the field of international relations. Many countries saw this as an opportunity to create a constructive, respectful atmosphere of communication when discussing the most pressing issues.
Of course, our initiative was not an accidental step. It became a logical stage of Turkmenistan’s long-term efforts as a peace-loving, neutral state aimed at ensuring a peaceful, stable course of international processes, creating conditions for solving various difficult situations only through political and diplomatic means and methods. The International Year of Peace and Trust provides such an opportunity. And because of this, its importance today takes on a truly global dimension.
Due to various circumstances, the world is going through a difficult time. As never before, we need the unity of all responsible, healthy, peace-loving forces, their unity and determination to resist negative phenomena and threats to undermine the global security architecture.
Having put forward the initiative of Peace and Trust based on dialogue as the only way for a viable and realistic approach to current world problems, Turkmenistan proceeds from the need for more active and effective use of the entire arsenal of politics and diplomacy, public opinion, historical experience, accumulated humanistic and cultural baggage. Constructive mobilization of potentials, political maturity, will and integrity of the world community and all States are required, regardless of their socio-political structure, size, population and other factors. Today, we are all responsible for the future of our planet.
When I speak of the mechanisms of such unification, I refer above all to the potential of the United Nations. It is essential to harness the capacities of this unique international organization, endowed with universal legitimacy and mandate. Cooperation within the framework of Peace and Trust must rest upon established political and legal foundations, guided by the clear and unequivocal principles enshrined in the UN Charter—equality, mutual respect, and non‑interference in sovereign affairs.
Following them means maintaining peace, predictability, and rebuilding the foundations of civilized communication with each other.
In promoting the concept of Peace and Trust today, in addition to traditional diplomacy, it is necessary to connect interparliamentary communication channels, women’s and youth diplomacy. Our country is doing a lot for this. In recent years alone, Turkmenistan has hosted a number of major events in this area, including representative international and regional forums. At the same time, we proceed from the fact that public diplomacy can and should become an important support for official diplomacy, having additional levers of influence on political decision-making.
Information dialogue plays a crucial role in establishing respectful and constructive interstate relations. We consider it as an important component of our Peace and Trust initiative, as well as the global formula “Dialogue is a guarantee of peace” put forward by Turkmenistan several years ago. Mass media must serve exclusively creative and constructive purposes. To achieve this, it is imperative to establish effective safeguards against cybercrime and to prevent the dissemination of biased or misleading materials within the information space.
We perceive cooperation on the platform of Peace and Trust as a systematic, continuous process of international dialogue aimed at the future.
It is designed to cover a significant range of activities. In this context, we consider it important to expand the projection of criteria of Peace and Trust to address universal challenges in such areas as environmental change, access to clean water and air, modern medicine, inclusive education, food security, and other important social issues.
We propose, together with partners from interested States and international organizations, to develop a new promising Roadmap for cooperation under the auspices of Peace and Trust. We are ready to discuss the substantive and organizational aspects of this initiative.
Dear participants!
Today, on December 12, Turkmenistan celebrates a historic date – the 30th anniversary of the international recognition of the status of permanent neutrality of our state.
During this period, Turkmen neutrality has shown its viability, full compliance with national goals, strategic objectives and guidelines on the world stage.
The effectiveness and stabilizing effect of Turkmenistan’s neutrality on regional processes, the development and consolidation of fraternal, friendly and mutually beneficial relations between the States of Central Asia and its neighboring countries and regions, our traditional partners, is indisputable.
Practice has shown full compliance of the basic principles of Turkmen neutrality with the interests and priorities of the UN activities, the implementation of its large-scale programs and strategies. Our country is always ready to put its neutrality at the service of peace, mutual understanding, cooperation, and the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals.
Permanent neutrality defines both Turkmenistan’s goals in the international arena and the means to achieve them, including tools such as preventive diplomacy, active peacemaking, and mediation.
Turkmenistan has put forward a number of initiatives, including the establishment of the UN Mediation Chamber, giving neutral and non-aligned states the status of priority partners of the UN in its peacekeeping efforts. We proceed from the need to geographically expand and strengthen the mandate of the UN Regional Centers for Preventive Diplomacy.
At the same time, I would like to emphasize that for Turkmenistan, neutrality is not just a model of foreign policy. It is the basis of our worldview, self-perception of the role and responsibility of both the state and the people, and our distinctive contribution to the development of modern civilization.
Neutrality, peace and trust, mutual respect and understanding – these concepts define the essence of Turkmenistan’s foreign policy and domestic structure today, having received their reinforcement at the legislative level.
Therefore, our neutrality remains unchanged and is not subject to external conjuncture, temporary, or situational factors. Turkmenistan strictly align and will continue to align all approaches to the global, regional and bilateral agenda, all its initiatives and practical actions with the status of permanent neutrality.
Dear friends!
Our Forum is a concrete and clear message to the world, a call for increased responsibility, foresight, solidarity, as well as for consolidating the efforts of the international community in the name of peace and progress.
We hope that the concepts of peace and trust as basic political and philosophical categories will find their support from the Community of Nations and will become a platform for creating a modern, solid, integral global architecture of the future. Together, we have a lot to do to improve the international situation, restore trust and a culture of political dialogue. Today’s Forum is an important step in this direction.
I wish all participants success in their activities for the benefit of peace, mutual understanding and cooperation.
Dear participants!
We are completing the work of the International Forum dedicated to the International Year of Peace and Trust, the International Day of Neutrality and the 30th anniversary of Turkmenistan’s neutrality.
During today’s meeting, the most important ideas and concepts, valuable assessments and proposals were voiced, which, undoubtedly, will find proper support and understanding, will be used and applied in real political and diplomatic work, cooperation and partnership between states, in the activities of international associations and organizations.
The peculiarity of the Forum is its openness and willingness of participants to jointly seek solutions to the most pressing issues of our time, their ability to perceive different points of view, and respect the arguments and arguments of the parties. This is the value of dialogue as the most promising, reasonable, and perhaps the only way to achieve truly meaningful results, create conditions for achieving balance and taking into account legitimate interests, build realistic and promising approaches, seeking agreement and constructive compromises on the most complex issues.
In this sense, the Forum has set the right, viable geopolitical and economic vectors for the long term.
Its content and messages are directed towards the future, focused on broad horizons of strategic planning, prioritization, and an orderly, systematic analysis of global trends in politics, economics, social and humanitarian spheres, and on a range of sustainable development topics.
I believe that the speeches of the heads and members of the delegations and the wide-ranging exchange of views have clearly shown that we are all united by a common understanding of the main, objective and indisputable reality – the need to create an integral, indivisible and meeting the genuine interests of all peoples of the planet security and development system.
It is possible to build such a system with one fundamental condition – the presence of goodwill, mutual trust and high responsibility for the fate of the world. The initiative to declare 2025 the International Year of Peace and Trust was motivated by the desire to establish these concepts and turn them into a determining factor in world politics.
Dear participants! Dear friends!
The forum is ending. It confirmed that the values and ideals expressed in its title, Peace and Trust, are gaining more and more supporters, no longer becoming abstract concepts, but real and effective factors of global development, a moral pillar and a driving force for constructive interaction and cooperation.
Of course, there is still a lot to be done to establish and consolidate these principles in consciousness and political practice. But there is no doubt that we are on the right track.
That is why I am convinced that the Ashgabat Forum and the creative impulses generated by it will serve to further fruitful joint work and bring visible results in the interests of peace and human progress.
Once again, on behalf of the President and the people of Turkmenistan, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to all the delegations for their participation in the Forum, informative speeches and initiatives.
I congratulate you on the International Day of Neutrality and the upcoming New Year, 2026!
I wish you all good health and new successes! ///TDH, 12 December 2025