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Relations with Azerbaijan meet Russia’s strategic interests

Business Materials 9 October 2015 19:56 (UTC +04:00)
Russia and Azerbaijan have set a record in terms of bilateral trade.
Relations with Azerbaijan meet Russia’s strategic interests

Moscow, Russia, Oct. 9

By Orkhan Yolchuyev - Trend:

Russia and Azerbaijan have set a record in terms of bilateral trade, Dmitry Rogozin, the Russian Deputy Prime Minister, said during the 15th meeting of the Russian-Azerbaijani intergovernmental commission on economic cooperation, Trend's special correspondent in Moscow said.

"As of 2014, the trade turnover between the countries increased by 12 percent, reaching a historic high of $4 billion," he said, stressing the high level of bilateral relations that meet the strategic objectives.

"The Russia-Azerbaijan mutual trade volume has increased more than twofold since 2009," Rogozin said. "Today the trade dynamics is one of the best in the CIS."

Rogozin said that a negative trend has been recently observed.

"Unfortunately, we saw a decline in the trade rate due to objective reasons as of the first seven months of this year," he said. "The trade turnover reduced 23.2 percent to $1.7 billion. However, the total volume of freight shipments mainly remained."

Rogozin said that industrial goods and agricultural products play an important role in trade between the two countries.

"The energy sector also plays an important role in the cooperation between the two countries," he said. "Today, we have discussed the work conducted by the group in the energy sector."

Alexey Likhachev, the Russian First Deputy Minister of Economic Development, also confirmed the record, stressing that these are the highest figures for the mutual trade volume between Russia and the CIS countries.

"Over $1.5 billion of Russian investments were made in Azerbaijan through the banking sector and such large companies as LUKOIL," he said. "We also have around $1.5 billion turnover of our services."

He said that around 600 Russian companies, including those with 100 percent Russian capital, work in Azerbaijan.

Yagub Eyyubov, the First Deputy Prime Minister, said that the intergovernmental commission is doing everything for the Azerbaijan-Russia relations to be always at a high level.

"A large number of Azerbaijani people work in Russia," he said. "Nobody oppresses them. On the contrary, all conditions were created for them," Eyyubov said.

Rogozin also said that some 15,000 students get education in the Russian language in Azerbaijan, including the branch of the Lomonosov Moscow State University.

"Some 9,000 Azerbaijani people study in the Russian higher education institutions," he said. "This once again shows the high level of relations between our countries."

Edited by CN

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