The Bishop of Croydon travelled to Kazakhstan for the Second Meeting of the Secretariat in Turkestan (11-14 October 2004). The purpose of this meeting of the Secretariat was to set the terms, direction and content for the Congress in Astana in 2006.

Hence, the following were discussed:

• The Principles of Inter-religious Dialogue
• The Concept of the 2006 Congress
• A Charter

The Secretariat invited a response to these matters within one month and expects to convene a Third Meeting of the Secretariat in Almaty in May or June 2005.The First Congress in Astana, attended by the Rt Revd Nick Baines (Bishop of Croydon, England) and Canon Jonathan Gough (Archbishop of Canterbury's Secretary for Ecumenical Affairs) in September 2003 agreed to the establishment of a Secretariat to prepare for a Second Congress in 2006 in Astana.The First Congress was convened at the initiative of the President of Kazakhstan, HE Nursultan Nazarbayev and involved seventeen groups of representatives of the major world religions.Rt Revd Nick BainesBishop of Croydon