ATR environment conference to open in Astana Friday.

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ASTANA, September 30 (Itar-Tass) - Environment ministers from 40
countries will gather in Astana on Friday to discuss environmental
problems and the development of the Asia Pacific Region, U.N.
Under-Secretary General Noeleen Heyzer of Singapore said on Thursday.
The Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia
and the Pacific (ESCAP) said the forum "has big importance". "This is the
unique interstate conference where the environment ministers are solving
problems of sustainable development," Heyzer said.
She recalled that the conference would take place under the motto of
"green growth". "If in 2005 the motto of green growth was a concept, now
it is a necessity," she stressed. "Let's see the disasters: the flood in
Pakistan and the drought in Russia. The list may be continued. Finally we
realised that our ecosystems were rather fragile," Heyzer said.
According to the U.N. Under-Secretary-General, the participants in the
conference should sign a declaration on the environmental protection and
the development, and a plan of action for 2011-2015. "We also hope that
the conference will help us work out a collective platform for the
upcoming global U.N. event - the Rio+20 Earth Summit on sustainable
development slated for 2012," she stressed.
-0-yur