Kazakhstan's President Nursultan Nazarbaev has urged the world to abandon nuclear weapons by the UN centenary in 2045.

Addressing the UN General Assembly in New York on September 28, Nazarbaev said a world without nuclear weapons should become "the main goal of the humankind in the 21st century."

The president said Kazakhstan was the first country in history to close a nuclear site as it renounced the world's fourth-largest nuclear arsenal.

The weapons were part of the arsenal of the Soviet Union before it collapsed in 1991.

Nazarbaev also urged the international community to find a swift resolution to the Ukrainian conflict and called for the "full implementation” of a cease-fire agreement reached in Minsk in February.

Nazarbayev also proposed a "unified global network to counter international terrorism and extremism."

Based on reporting by AP and Interfax