Greek President Karolos Papoulias expressed his satisfaction with his visit to Baku and the hospitality provided him and the Greek delegation in Azerbaijan.
"We together with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev held a wide exchange of opinions. They were related to our bilateral relations and regional and global issues. We have excellent bilateral relations. We have signed three bilateral agreements on cooperation in transport, science and energy," Papoulias said in his statement for media.
Giving a very positive assessment to bilateral relations and stressing the importance of the cooperation documents signed, the President of Greece called for further development of trade and economic relations. He said the Azerbaijani-Greek business forum would open up broad opportunities in this issue.
Speaking about the fruitful ties in the energy sphere, the President of Greece said his country was interested in transporting natural gas from Azerbaijan.
Greece, he said, highly appreciates the Memorandum of Understanding signed with the State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) in the energy field. "We believe our bilateral relations, especially economic and trade relations can be further enhanced. From this perspective, the upcoming Azerbaijani-Greek business forum opens up great opportunities for further expansion of our economic and trade relations" Papoulias added.
"Greece has become an energy hub for South and Central Europe. Given this perspective, we are also interested in building a pipeline to transport natural gas. We want this pipeline, running from Azerbaijan and passing through Greece, to be laid in the direction of Italy," he added.
"I have also informed President Ilham Aliyev about problems. Regarding the Cyprus issue, we expressed a hope for settlement of this problem within the framework of the UN Security Council's resolutions. We believe such international issues should be solved exactly in this plane. Moreover, we touched upon the events ongoing in North Africa," Papoulias said.
Karolos Papoulias highlighted the importance of a negotiated settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh through the efforts of countries co-chairing the OSCE Minsk Group. He said Greece was paying special attention to the implementation of the Eastern Partnership program.
"Our country also pays a great attention to the Black Sea Economic cooperation initiative. From this perspective, we appreciate the memorandum signed between Azerbaijan and the European Union. I assure President Aliyev that he can rely on Greece's real support," he said.
Papoulias expressed his deep appreciation to President Aliyev for the very candid discussion, and expressed confidence that the Greece- Azerbaijan relations will further expand.
