Baku, Azerbaijan, July 22
Trend:
The meeting of Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin as part of a working visit shows the trusting relations between the two countries’ leaders, Elkhan Alasgarov, head of Expert Council of the Baku International Policy and Security Network (Baku Network), told Trend July 22.
He made the remarks while commenting on the July 21 meeting of the Azerbaijani and Russian presidents in Sochi.
“Relations between the countries have strategic nature, and the fact of holding this meeting of the presidents in a confidential form gives reason to believe that topical regional and international issues were discussed,” noted Alasgarov.
Naturally, the issues of cooperation in the Caspian Sea, the legal status of the sea were considered, after all, the work on the Convention on the Caspian Sea’s status will be completed soon, said the expert.
Azerbaijan and Russia are linked by a lot of ties: the relations in the political sphere are at a high level, the two countries support each other on international platform, they have close economic, military, political ties and interests, added Alasgarov.
“Of course, consideration of settlement of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is topical for Azerbaijan. Armenia in every possible way hinders the establishment of warm relations between Azerbaijan and Russia, however, the results of the visit indicate that all these efforts are vain and don’t work,” he noted.
The expert added that Russia and Azerbaijan are inclined to develop relations and the two countries’ leaders discussed the issues of deepening cooperation in all spheres, as well as within the framework of regional projects.
The visit took place at a time when the Russian-Turkish relations are developing, said Alasgarov.
Meanwhile, the relations in the formats Azerbaijan-Russia-Turkey, Russia-Azerbaijan-Iran, and, undoubtedly, the meeting of the two leaders will give positive results for the development of cooperation, added the expert.
The conflict between the two South Caucasus countries began in 1988 when Armenia made territorial claims against Azerbaijan. As a result of the ensuing war, in 1992 Armenian armed forces occupied 20 percent of Azerbaijan, including the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven surrounding districts.
The 1994 ceasefire agreement was followed by peace negotiations. Armenia has not yet implemented four UN Security Council resolutions on withdrawal of its armed forces from the Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding districts.