Baku, Azerbaijan, April 30
By Fikret Dolukhanov – Trend:
The Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway is playing an essential role in increasing mutual trade turnover between Turkey and Uzbekistan, the press service of the Uzbek president said in a statement on April 30.
The statement was made during the talks between Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan with the participation of official delegations of the two countries on April 30.
“We are pleased to see that our multifaceted relations, based on the common values, are rising to a whole new level of quality. Our private conversation once again confirmed existence of a great political will for the development of cooperation between our countries,” Mirziyoyev said.
The president noted that he and his Turkish counterpart openly and in details discussed all issues directly related to the interests of the two nations, as well as current and future plans.
“I am very glad to visit Uzbekistan, a country with which we have deep historical ties. The growth of economic interaction, which was the result of our dialogue over the past few years, indicates that we are on the right track. The results are obvious,” Erdogan said.
According to him, Turkish business people are interested in Uzbekistan, which creates wide opportunities for Turkish companies, entrepreneurs and tourists.
In 2017, the volume of bilateral trade increased by 30 percent and amounted to $1.5 billion. In the 1Q2018, the figure increased by 20 percent more.
During the talks, the two sides noted that there are good possibilities for increasing the volume of trade to $5 billion in the next few years. The parties outlined promising areas of cooperation and proposed numerous projects in various fields.
The Uzbek side noted that the country is ready to expand the supply of products of light, chemical and metallurgical industries, as well as mechanical and electrical goods, leather and footwear to the Turkish market. The Uzbek-Turkish trading house opened in Istanbul is to play an important role in this regard.
Special attention was also paid to strengthening cooperation in transport communications and transit. The two sides underlined great importance of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway for the intensification of trade. The parties emphasized importance of further optimizing transit tariffs.
The issues of strengthening investment, financial and technical cooperation, development of ties in tourism, health, culture and others were also discussed.
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