Share :

Download PDF :

AzerNews (30 April 2018)

Relations between Turkey and Azerbaijan are developing in all areas, as evidenced by the visit of President Ilham Aliyev to Ankara, head of the Turkey-Azerbaijan inter-parliamentary friendship group, Necdet Unuvar told Trend.

Unuvar noted that the Azerbaijani president's visit to Turkey was very fruitful and important.

"The president of fraternal Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, made his first foreign visit to Turkey after being re-elected as head of state on April 11. Mutual visits of the presidents of Turkey and Azerbaijan after elections have become a kind of tradition," Unuvar said.

He stated that there are strong ties between Turkey and Azerbaijan in all spheres, and this is more than obvious.

"At the same time, the peoples of Turkey and Azerbaijan are very close to each other. During the joint press conference, the presidents of the two countries also stressed the importance of relations between Baku and Ankara," the head of the inter-parliamentary group said.

Unuvar noted that Azerbaijan provided significant support to Turkey during the attempted military coup.

The head of the inter-parliamentary group said that during the 2016 military coup attempt in Turkey, when the building of the Turkish Parliament was shelled, President Ilham Aliyev and other Azerbaijani officials were the first to call Turkey.

"The visit of the Azerbaijani president to Turkey will further strengthen relations between the fraternal countries," said Unuvar.

Turkey participates in the majority of large-scale projects implemented by Azerbaijan in the region. Among them are the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan and Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum projects. Turkey and Azerbaijan demonstrated their leadership in signing the agreement on the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) project in Istanbul in 2012, which is one of the important components of the Southern Gas Corridor, which will allow Azerbaijan to send gas to the world market. In the summer this year, gas will begin to flow through TANAP to Turkey first, and then through the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline to Europe in 2020.

Another large-scale project of the century is the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, which will ensure more active economic and trade cooperation between Ankara and Baku with the involvement of a large flow of goods from Central Asia to Europe. With the launch of the railway in November 2017, the time of cargo transportation decreased by 12-15 days. Before the commissioning of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, the cargo flow between Europe and China was realized via sea routes, lasting on average 25-30 days.

The State Customs Committee of Azerbaijan reported that trade turnover with Turkey in 2017 amounted to $2.64 billion, of which $1.37 billion fell on exports to Turkey. Trade turnover between the two countries increased by 14.8 percent in 2017. In the first quarter of this year, the Azerbaijani-Turkish trade turnover amounted to $573.1 million (an increase of 3.7 percent for the year).

https://www.azernews.az/nation/131283.html