ASTANA – Kazakh Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Murat Nurtleu and Croatian Minister of Foreign and European Affairs Gordan Grlić-Radman met in Zagreb on Nov. 21 to outline priority areas for cooperation.
Murat Nurtleu and Gordan Grlić-Radman. Photo credit: Foreign Ministry’s press service.
According to the Foreign Ministry’s press service, the officials discussed a broad range of bilateral topics, including political dialogue, strengthening trade, economic and investment collaboration, and enhancing cultural and humanitarian ties.
Kazakhstan and Croatia have substantial potential to deepen mutually beneficial cooperation in areas such as energy, transport, including civil aviation, agriculture, digitalization and innovation, education, and tourism.
Nurtleu highlighted Croatia’s role as a long-standing and close partner of Kazakhstan in the Balkans and the European Union.
“We highly value our meaningful political dialogue at all levels, based on friendship and mutual trust. Economic cooperation is one of the key areas of Kazakh-Croatian relations,” said Nurtleu.
Croatia is Kazakhstan’s third-largest trading partner in Southeast Europe. In 2023, mutual trade turnover reached $432 million. Nurtleu and Grlić-Radman agreed to enhance the work of the Intergovernmental Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation, with its second meeting scheduled for 2025 in Astana.
Grlić-Radman expressed Zagreb’s interest in fostering progressive relations with Astana and reaffirmed Croatia’s readiness to promote mutually beneficial partnerships across all areas of shared interest.
The ministers also exchanged views on current international agenda topics and discussed cooperation within multilateral frameworks such as the UN, Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and others. The officials also addressed partnership in Central Asia and the Balkans, as well as global and regional stability.
Nurtleu and Grlić-Radman signed the Cooperation Program between the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan and the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs of Croatia for 2025-2027, and a memorandum of cooperation between the Institute of Diplomacy, Academy of Public Administration of Kazakhstan and the Croatian Diplomatic Academy.
