SEEKING SUPPORT: Second Deputy Premier and Minister of Interior Prince Naif holds talks with Tajikistan’s Foreign Minister Hamrakhan Zarifi in Riyadh on Tuesday. (SPA)

RIYADH: Decks have been cleared for the recruitment of hundreds of Tajik workers who lost their jobs in Russia and elsewhere due to the global economic crisis. The first group of 2,000 workers will possibly be deployed in Saudi Arabia in a staggered schedule later this year.

The plan has been given the green light following the visit of Tajikistan’s Foreign Minister Hamrakhan Zarifi, who also secured Saudi support to host a meeting of Islamic foreign ministers in Tajikistan next year.

After meeting with Second Deputy Premier and Minister of Interior Prince Naif and Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal Tuesday night, Zarifi said the talks covered the whole range of bilateral, regional and international issues of common concern.

The Tajik minister handed over a message of President Imamali Rahmanov to Prince Naif to be delivered to Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah. Senior Saudi officials and Tajikistan Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Salahuddin Nasreddinov attended the talks.

Zarifi expressed his gratitude for the Saudi support for holding the 37th meeting of the foreign ministers of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) in Dushanbe in 2010.

“Tajikistan has maintained good relations with all countries and strongly supported efforts to bring peace and stability in Afghanistan and Iraq,” he said.

The Tajik minister is scheduled to meet with senior OIC officials.

The Kingdom and Tajikistan have decided to forge closer cooperation in the field of manpower recruitment.

Tajikistan has one of the highest remittance rates in the world, according to a recent World Bank report, but virtually all of it has come from workers in Russia.

The report said between September and November last year, remittances from Tajik migrants working in Russia dropped by more than 50 percent. That decrease alone accounts for a 20 percent drop in the country’s GDP. Nearly one million Tajik men work abroad at the moment, said the report.

Zarifi made a stopover in Dubai on May 18 on his way to Riyadh where he met with senior UAE officials and managers of the Abu Dhabi Fund for Arab Economic Development.