ALMATY. May 21. KAZINFORM /Daniyar Sikhimbayev/ - An open sitting of the ESCAP member states’ ministers has begun in Almaty city today. Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev is taking part in the event. More than 400 delegates from 62 member countries are participating in the 63rd session of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific. Special sitting titled Achievement of the Millennium Development Goals in the ESCAP region will take place within the frame of the session. Besides, the participants will discuss political problems of the region, development of health-improving systems and other actual issues. In his address, presented by the UN Under-Secretary-General Jose Antonio Ocampo to the session’s participants, Secretary-General of the United Nations Ban Ki-moon noted that the successful achievement of the Millennium Development Goals in a great measure depended on the progress reached in the Asian-Pacific Region. “For the previous decades countries of the region made a record advance in the poverty level reduction. Nevertheless, more than 600 million of our nationals failed to benefit from the region’s economic development and are forced to struggle for existence day after day. It is clear that we should multiply our efforts”, the address reads. The ESCAP is the largest of the five UN regional commissions and has the greatest experience in determination and analysis of economic and social tendencies in the Asian-Pacific Region in comparison with the other organizations. The Commission supports socioeconomic development of the Asian and the Pacific countries, their mutual cooperation and interaction with the third countries. Three educational and research establishments on agricultural development, statistics and technologies transfer work under the auspices of the ESCAP. Top priority problems of the Commission are promotion of interregional trade and investments, technologies transfer, privatization and entrepreneurship, environmental protection, urbanization, social development and etc.