Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzai Sunday left for Turkmenistan's capital Ashgabat to attend the funeral ceremony of late President Saparmurat Niyazov, a statement of Afghan presidency released here said.

Niazov, who ruled the oil and gas-rich central Asian state since the collapse of Soviet Union, died last Thursday at the age of 66.

Relations between Afghanistan and Turkmenistan, the two neighboring Asian states, have been cordial since the collapse of the former Soviet Union and Turkmenistan emerging as an independent state in 1991.

In addition to enhancing trade relations between the two neighbors, Turkmenistan has been supplying power to parts of Afghanistan's western and northern provinces of Heart and Farah.

Source: Xinhua