“I was very pleased to have the opportunity to meet with His Excellency President Karimov, Foreign Minister Norov, and other members of government. I also appreciated the opportunity to meet with the head of the legislative chamber as well as the president of the Senate,” Blake said in Tashkent.

He added: “My visit is a reflection of the determination of President Obama and Secretary Clinton to strengthen ties between the United States and Uzbekistan. We want to do this on the basis of our common interests and mutual respect.”

“I conveyed to president Karimov America’s sincere appreciation for Uzbekistan’s support for international efforts in Afghanistan. The United States and Uzbekistan have a shared interest in peace and stability in Afghanistan. I also appreciated President Karimov’s perspectives and advice on developments in Afghanistan and the wider region. We also discussed ways that the US and Uzbekistan can build our partnership across a wide range of areas. These include trade and development, border security, cooperation on narcotics, the development of civil society, and individual rights.

“To better enable a future dialogue we discussed initiating a broad and structured mechanism that allows us to set concrete targets for progress to work through our differences and do so in a manner of mutual respect. I told President Karimov of my personal commitment to the success of this dialogue. And I told him of my confidence that the United States and Uzbekistan can make progress on the broad range of priorities on our bilateral agenda,” Blake said.