Baku, Azerbaijan, Mar. 6
By Dalga Khatinoglu, Farhad Daneshvar – Trend:
Social and cultural backgrounds have helped the ties between Iran and Azerbaijan to rise to strategic levels, a senior Iranian official told Trend.
Commenting on Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s recent visit to Tehran, Parviz Esmaeili, deputy chief of Iranian presidential office for communication and information, said unique opportunities have been created for boosting ties between the two countries.
In addition to friendly ties, Tehran and Baku are capable of turning into a hub of regional and trans-regional links.
Esmaeili said unique opportunities for cooperation between Iran and Azerbaijan have been created over the past three years following adoption of policies by President Hassan Rouhani’s administration to expand cooperation and establish friendly ties with neighboring and Islamic countries.
“Over the recent years, the presidents of Iran and Azerbaijan have met eight times. President Rouhani has visited Baku two times and President Aliyev has visited Tehran three times paving the ground for inking significant and unprecedented documents,” he added.
Speaking about joint projects between the two countries for investment and development of rail and transportation corridors, Esmaeili said the inauguration of Astara (Iran)-Astara (Azerbaijan) railway and other considerable capacities for cooperation on the areas of energy, trade, transportation, tourism and environmental issues will lead Tehran and Baku to becoming a hub of regional and trans-regional ties.
Parviz Esmaeili further touched upon the Iran-Azerbaijan-Russia and Iran-Azerbaijan-Turkey trilateral cooperation formats, describing them as successful examples of cooperation in protecting stability, security, regional development as well as combating terrorist threats.
Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev, leading a large delegation, arrived in Tehran on March 5 to discuss regional and international issues with senior Iranian officials.
According to the State Customs Committee of Azerbaijan, Iran’s exports to Azerbaijan in 2016 boomed by 78 percent posting $161 million.
In the meantime, Azerbaijan’s exports to Iran indicated 45 percent surge reaching $50 million.
This is while Iran’s exports to Azerbaijan in January 2017 doubled compared to the same month of last year surpassing $14 million with Azerbaijan exporting $14 million worth of goods to Iran, indicating a 64-percent growth.