Azerbaijan, Baku, February 5 / Trend , T.Jafarov/
Member-countries of the Economic Cooperation Organization (ECO) should increase multilateral cooperation, including in the field of medicine and health, said the member of the health committee of the Iranian parliament Abduljabbar Keremi.
Iran is developing in the same rates with the Western countries in the field of medical education, supply, production and quality of medicines. "We hope that the Azerbaijani-Iranian cooperation in the field of health will be expanded," Keremi told Trend .
A meeting of health ministers of ECO member-countries took place in Baku on Feb. 5. Currently the ECO brings together Afghanistan, Iran, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Pakistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
The member of the delegation led by Health Minister of Iran Marziya Wahid Dastgerdi, who is on visit to Baku, Keremi said that 470 Iranian students are educated at universities in Baku on medicine and dentistry, as well as many Azerbaijani students are studying at the universities of Tabriz, Urmia, and Ardabil.
"We are interested in improving the quality of education, strengthening controls, expanding services to Azerbaijani patients arriving in Iran for treatment, as well as to expand cooperation in other spheres," said Iranian MP.
As the cooperation has weakly developed between the ECO countries with regards to medical science and services, the current meeting in Baku worth to be positively assessed in the development of cooperation in these spheres, the Iranian MP said.
The chairman of the Azerbaijani Parliament Agtay Asadov will visit Iran next month. "We will mainly discuss the issues of education of students of both countries at the universities, quality of education, problems of students, as well as validity of issued diplomas and providing students with jobs. If the Azerbaijani side has any requirement, we will try fulfill it within our opportunities," said Keremi.
The cooperation of ECO member-countries strengthened after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and now it becomes more active. Presently, the population of the ECO countries comprises 300 million and it makes up 4.7 percent of world population. "So, there is a great potential and market for the cooperation," he said.
This meeting in Baku is the 20th meeting of ECO, and it needs to increase the number of such meetings and intensify discussions of the member countries regarding multilateral issues, the Iranian MP said.