On February 3, 2023, the Ambassador of the Kyrgyz Republic to the USA, Bakyt Amanbaev, met with the Executive Director of the World Bank, Dominique Favre, and his deputy Yashik Kursky. Three issues were discussed at the meeting. Ambassador Bakyt Amanbaev informed that on the 8th January this year, the President of the Kyrgyz Republic, Sadyr Japarov, addressed the international financial development institutions with a proposal to exchange external debt of the country accumulated over the last thirty years to projects targeted at tackling environmental issues, and invited representatives of the World Bank to support the above initiative of the President of the Kyrgyz Republic.
In the meeting Bakyt Amanbaev noting the many successful cases of effectively executed debt to nature swaps in the history of developing countries, informed the Bank representatives that the support by the World Bank of the initiative would allow Kyrgyzstan to finance among others the construction of small and medium-sized hydroelectric power plants in the country and the detoxification of tailings located throughout the country. The representatives of the World Bank, agreed to to discuss this issue internally at the relevant meetings of the World Bank.
Bakyt Amanbaev also spoke about the mega projects that are being implemented on the initiative of the President of the Kyrgyz Republic, projects which were only talked about for the last thirty years such as the construction of the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway and the construction of Kambar-Ata-1 hydroelectric power station, a megaproject in the region that is for the first time in the history will be built together with Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The Ambassador comprehensively explained that the implementation of such large-scale projects will contribute to the economic development of not only Kyrgyzstan, but also Central Asian countries.
Bakyt Amanbaev said that the construction of the China-Kyrgyz-Uzbekistan railway will lead to access to the sea route of the entire Central Asian region, and invited representatives of the World Bank to financially support this project. Also, Bakyt Amanbaev announced that on January 6 of this year, the energy ministers of Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan met in Bishkek and signed an agreement on the joint construction of the Kambar Ata 1 hydroelectric power plant, and invited the World Bank to provide financial support to the regional project.
Representatives of the World Bank noted that they are interested in supporting projects at the regional level, and promised to discuss this issue at a high level and provide additional information on its results. The parties also agreed to work together with the representative office of the World Bank in Bishkek in the future to implement the above-mentioned initiative.