Kazakhstan’s ambassador to Sri Lanka has proposed establishing a Sri Lanka–Kazakhstan Parliamentary Friendship Association, and Speaker of Parliament Dr. Jagath Wickramaratne has said steps will be taken to create it.
Ambassador Sergey Viktorov put the proposal to the Speaker at a meeting in Parliament, the Island reported on Saturday. He framed it as a vehicle for parliamentary exchanges and for stronger institutional cooperation between the two legislatures.
The Speaker expressed support and said steps would be taken to establish the association. Such bodies are a standing feature of Sri Lankan parliamentary diplomacy — a Sri Lanka–China Parliamentary Friendship Association already exists, chaired by Minister Bimal Ratnayake.
The economic agenda
Both sides identified the same list of sectors for closer cooperation: investment, trade, agriculture, tourism and energy.
Wickramaratne reaffirmed Sri Lanka’s longstanding friendship with Kazakhstan, dating to the establishment of diplomatic relations in 1992, and described the opening of Kazakhstan’s first resident embassy in Colombo in 2025 as an important milestone. He said Sri Lanka was keen to expand cooperation across those sectors and invited Kazakhstan to explore investment opportunities, pointing to the country’s progress towards political and economic stability.
Viktorov also briefed the Speaker on Kazakhstan’s recently introduced parliamentary system, which is based on a unicameral legislature — a point of institutional comparison with Sri Lanka, which also has a single chamber.
The meeting is not dated
The Island says the discussion took place at Parliament “recently” and gives no date. The meeting therefore predates the filing by an unstated interval, and this desk cannot establish when it occurred from a citable source.
No verified newsroom other than the Island carried the meeting, and the Parliament of Sri Lanka’s own news service — the natural primary source for a Speaker-level call — does not list it among the items currently reachable on its news rail, which extends back only a few days. The release that the Island’s account appears to draw on could not be retrieved and dated, so it is not cited here.
Not reported
The filing does not say when the association would be constituted, who would chair it, or how many members it would have. It gives no trade or investment figures for the bilateral relationship, names no specific project or agreement under discussion, and does not say whether Sri Lanka maintains a resident mission in Kazakhstan. Nothing in the account indicates that any binding commitment was made.
