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Azeri president arrives in Tehran for talks on enhancement of ties

Xinhua, February 23, 2016 Adjust font size:

The President of Republic Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev arrived in Iran's capital Tehran on Tuesday for an official visit and talks on regional political issues, mutual ties and economic cooperation.

The visit of the Azeri president is taking place at an the invitation of President Hassan Rouhani, official IRNA news agency reported.

Aliyev is expected to meet with his Iranian counterpart and Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei as well as a number of other Iranian senior officials.

The visit to Iran aims to bolster relations between the two neighboring states, Aliyev said Monday, expressing the hope that the visit would help broaden affinities between the two nations more than ever.

Iran and Azerbaijan have signed a number of agreements in political, economic and cultural areas, and the two sides will review regional and global developments and will sign memorandums of understanding (MoUs) on mutual relations, he was quoted as saying by IRNA.

Iran-Azerbaijan joint economic commission has offered a new economic package to augment trade and economic cooperation, he said. "The prospect of economic cooperation between Iran and Azerbaijan is very promising," Aliyev added.

On Sunday, Iran's Minister of Communications and Information Technology Mahmoud Vaezi said that during Aliyev's visit, Iran and Azerbaijan would sign 11 cooperation agreements with the aim of boosting bilateral relations in political and economic areas.

It would be Aliyev's third visit to Iran over the past two years after President Hassan Rouhani took the office, Vaezi said on the sidelines of a meeting with the visiting Azeri Minister of Economy and Industry Shahin Mustafayev.

Vaezi also announced that Iran had plans to ease issuance of visa for the Azeri nationals and expected reciprocity by Azerbaijan, according to official IRNA news agency.

"We will do our best to ease visa issuance for Azeri nationals so to help easy visit to Iran for economic activities and tourism," Vaezi was quoted as saying.

There were growing interests on both sides for tourist cooperations as well as economic activities which have prompted the two governments to embark on facilitating visa issuance, he said.

Iran and Azerbaijan share, to a large extent, similar history, religion, ethnicity, and culture. The territory of what is now called the Republic of Azerbaijan was separated from Iran in the first half of the 19th century after it was occupied by Russia

Iran and Azerbaijan are the only official Shiite Muslim nations in the world. Despite this, Azerbaijan is officially secular and discourages religious influence on the state affairs.

Also, the world's largest population of Azerbaijanis live in Iran, far outnumbering those in neighboring Azerbaijan Republic. Endit