Azerbaijan, Baku, Jan. 24 / Trend /
The Caspian European Integration Business Club (CEIBC) held a session "Caspian-European dialogue" in Baku on January 23 with participation of heads of diplomatic representative offices of the EU and Caspian-Black Sea region countries in the Republic of Azerbaijan, CEIBC said. The event was held under the chairmanship of Ambassador Roland Kobia, Head of the EU Mission to Azerbaijan and permanent representative of EU in CEIBC.
Addressing the session Roland Kobia emphasized that the turnover of goods of the European Union with Azerbaijan keeps constantly growing. Besides, energy still remains a main sphere of cooperation. He stressed the availability of big potential for expanding economic cooperation especially in the energy and agricultural sectors.
The Ambassador noted that entry in WTO meets interests of Azerbaijan. "It will considerably ease the work of businessmen", he proceeded. According to him, many countries of the region still face monopoly problems. In this regard, he finds it necessary to promote development of competition at the market.
Taking the floor German Ambassador to Azerbaijan Herbert Quelle noted that his country had created a trade chamber Germany-Azerbaijan last year. He added that it is a perfect communication center for cooperation development and invited CEIBC companies to get actively engaged in this organization. According to him, the trade chamber Germany-Azerbaijan has become the second in the CIS after creation of the similar organization in Moscow.
British Ambassador to Azerbaijan Peter Bateman said at the session that 50% of investments to Azerbaijan flow from Great Britain. "We are the main partners and show interest toward development of cooperation not only in the energy sector", the Ambassador emphasized.
Heads of other diplomatic representative offices also noted that EU and Azerbaijan have been reliable partners both in the energy and non oil sector.
In reply to the questions of CEIBC member companies about simplification of the visa regime Roland Kobia said that the following meeting of experts for discussion of this issue would take place in mid of March 2013.
"Certain success is observed today regarding the issue of visa regime simplification. However, re-admission issues still need to be actively worked over. Both of these issues are interrelated and it is impossible to gain success on the second issue without getting the first ones solved", R.Kobia noted.
He stressed the importance of elimination of visa restrictions and noted that considerable success had been gained with Georgia in this issue within 6 months. Solution of this issue will promote the growth of mutual visits under more reasonable prices for visas, R.Kobia noted.
Business doing problems between Azerbaijan and EU countries as well as the ways of their solution was also discussed at the session.
Addressing the session, Telman Aliyev, President and CEO of Caspian-European Integration Business Club (CEIBC), spoke about CEIBC. According to him, CEIBC was established in June 2002 under an active participation of Caspian Energy International Media Group and support of big oil-gas companies operating in the Caspian-Black Sea region. Ilham Aliyev, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, has been an honorary chairman of CEIBC since 2002.
Since the moment of creation CEIBC has been drawing oil industry profits for the development of the non oil sector. CEIBC operates in 50 countries worldwide, carries out an active work in the direction of dialogue support between government agencies and private sector.
CEIBC honorary membership certificate was presented to Ambassador Roland Kobia at the session. New CEIBC member companies were also given certificates.
CEIBC member companies made presentations during the event. Participating in the meeting were also executives of companies, representatives of diplomatic agencies from Germany, Great Britain, Switzerland, Romania, Czechia, Bulgaria, Austria, Hungary, Poland, Greece, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Netherlands, Turkey, Ukraine and other countries.