turkmenistan's president commended his country's economic partnership with japan. he cited a number of projects underway in the country funded by japanese investment. they involve the oil, gas, and chemical industries. he said, the corporation between the two countries offers great potential. abe said he hopes to promote dialogue between japan and the central asian nations to cric t contribute to political and economic stability in the region and says the companies helping them will help enhance economic ties. the two leaders then signed a joint statement welcoming the participation of japanese firms in the construction of natural gas and thermal power plants. the leaders said their governments will help facilitate the projects worth $18 billion. the statement also said turkmenistan will introduce japanese-style educational methods to teach advanced engineering and technology. turkmenistan has the world's fourth largest reserves of natural gas. >>> china's economy showed more signs this week of slowing down. for the first time since 2009, economic growth dropped to

. >>> japan's prime minister has met with the president of turkmenistan. shinzo abe and gurbanguly berdimuhamedov have agreed to encourage japanese firms to invest more in turkmenistan's energy sector. abe is on a tour of countries to promote economic ties with the region. >> translator: we are grateful to japan for the partnership between the two countries. as for investment, a number of very large projects in the oil, gas and chemical industries are under way in turkmenistan. with the funding of japanese investment. >> berdimuhamedov says the cooperation between the two countries offers great potential. abe hopes to promote dialogue between japan and the central asian nations to contribute a political -- to political and economic stability in the region. >> translator: the japanese delegation includes many business leaders. i'm glad they'll have an opportunity to meet you in person. i'm certain this will lead to major progress in our economic relations. >> the leaders then signed a joint statement. it welcomed the participation of japanese firms in the c

sources say turkmenistan's country will issue a contract worth $30 million for the project. the gas fired power plant is constructed in the north eastern part of the country with an output of 400 megawatts. sources say the power systems will supply turbines and power jen rapters as part of the new project. infrastructure exports are one of prime minister's growth strategies. the government and corporation are expected to sign a contract during abe's tour. >>> tokyo stocks fell thursday with the nikkei average snapping two days of gains. we have the details from the tokyo stock exchange. >>> many investors in tokyo sold shares to book profits from recent rallies, but experts for fresh stimulus by the bank of japan provide lift to the sentiment. the nikkei was down .6% closing down at 18435. it lost ground in the afternoon on profit taking. the broader topix fell more than .5% pushing the index lower was the corporation, shares dropping more than 10% after the heavy machinery maker cut the full year net profit forecast by more than half. honda motor is down 1.2% on the news th

former soviet states of uzbekistan, tajikistan and turkmenistan, comments came a day after presidentbama made the announcement that thousands of troops would stay in afghanistan to help fight the resurgent taliban. >> translator: it is particularly important to monitor the situation at the external borders of the commonwealth. terrorists of various kinds gain more and more influence and do not hide plans of further expansion. >> the move could put russian troops on afghanistan's border as part of the coalition defense forces. al jazeera rory challands has more from moscow. >> two relevant documents have been signed on friday in kazakh stan. one tcass kazakhstan. this allows for the grouping of border forces and other institutions from cis member states designed to resolve crisis situations on the external borders. what this would allow the country to do is to react faster to any threats that come from outside. now, plenty of questions still remain about this. would it be a standing body of armed men, armed forces, troops ready, and waiting to repel any attack? or would it be more of

who this past year continued this year, i think , china, iran, north korea, saudi arabia, sudan, turkmenistan. secondly, we don't have direct relations, so we continued through international partners and mobilizing international coalitions to put continuing pressure for north korea to ease its restrictions on religious freedom and let every one of those prisoners of conscience, and there are far too many, and they often taste brutal conditions in the presence -- prisons. the united states government is always working day in and day out to ensure that it citizens who are imprisoned unjustly have due process and for the exercise of fundamental internationally protected lights are a route that are allowed to go -- protected rights are allowed to go free. we do that as best we can through the international contacts with north korea going on every day. the question of how many, i actually don't know the answer to the specific cases. we can't comment on them, american privacy laws protect them from allowing us to talk about their situation. they are not in a situation to give us authority, permissi

defense from five of the countries surrounding afghanistan to bring together to talk pakistan, turkmenistan, uzbekistan, disney to stand altogether to talk about racial issues, border issues, drug smuggling. what they can do to enable each other to fight this common enemy so that was quite a good. >> very good. thank you, general. thank you, mr. chair. >> ms. duckworth. >> general, thank you for being here. i want to talk all the bit about the capacity of the afghan troops that we are training. from your testimony you characterize a security forces performance of the afghan national defense treaty forces as uneven come inconsistent, still require broad support. you talk about the fact that without key enablers and competent operational level leaders i can't handle the fight alone. in contrast you talk about the iss f. and how they are actually able to mount operations and seem to be much more successful. what i'm concerned is a we seem to be talking a lot metrics buttercream feta security force in terms of numbers. how many to rethink a need to publish the mission as opposed to the capacity

defense from five of the countries surrounding afghanistan to bring them together to talk pakistan, turkmenistan, uzbekistan, all came together to talk about regional issues, byrder issues, drug smuggling, what they can do to enable each other to fight this common enemy, so that was quite good. >> very good. thank you, general. thank you, mr. chair. >> thank you. miss duckworth. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general, thank you for being here. i want to talk a little bit about the capacity of the afghan troops that we are training. from your testimony, you characterize a security force's performance of the afghan national defense security forces as uneven, inconsistent, still require broad support. you talk about the fact that without key enablers and competent operational level leaders they can't handle the fight alone. in contrast, you talk about the assf and how they are actually able to mount operations and seem to be much more successful. what i'm concerned is that we seem to be talking a lot in our metrics about our training of security forces in terms of numbers. how many do we think they ne