The D-8 Secretary-General Dr. Seyed AliMohammad Mousavi met Ambassador Ay?e Sinirlioglu, the new D-8 Commissioner of Turkey in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs today. 

Dr. Mousavi congratulated Ambassador Sinirlioglu for her assumption into the office and her new role as the D-8 Commissioner. He discussed the D-8 activities and achievements with her and shared his views. 

Ambassador Sinirlioglu welcomed Secretary-General and thanked him for the achievements of the Secretariat especially during his tenure. She mentioned that the D-8 had special significance to Turkey and as host of the D-8 Secretariat, Turkey would put more efforts to reinvigorate the Organization. She agreed with Secretary-General that the Organization must accelerate its efforts in order to reach the intra-trade target of US$ 500 billion set by the D-8 Leaders in the Roadmap at Kuala Lumpur Summit.  Although trade is high, it is not reflective of the real potentials of the D-8 countries. 

They agreed that the D-8 was moving towards implementation of policies in the next phase of its life cycle and Turkey had a more significant role to put the policies and agreements into action during its Chairmanship in the coming years. They underscored the need for projects that would directly benefit people to improve their economic standard.

They discussed about the importance of  the D-8 Observer status in the United Nations General Assembly which would add to the image of the Organization. They also emphasized on more actions to improve visibility and image of the Organization.

Secretary-General invites the Commissioner of Turkey to take part at the special session of the Commission to be held on 6-7 November 2014 in Istanbul. They also discussed about the 9th Summit which is scheduled to be held  in December 2014. The Commissioner of Turkey informed that the Government is working to finalize the date and venue of the Summit and would announce the same at the soonest.