Meeting of the High-Level Cooperation Council to held by the end of the year –Ambassador

Meeting of the High-Level Cooperation Council to held by the end of the year –Ambassador

Azerbaijani citizens are to be able to stay in Turkey without a visa for three months, rather than the current one month, Turkey's envoy has said.

Ankara hopes that Azerbaijan and Turkey can soon lift visa requirements for their citizens altogether, Turkey's ambassador to Azerbaijan, Hulusi Kilic, told a press conference.

"We are doing everything possible for our Azerbaijani brothers and sisters to feel at ease in Turkey," Kilic said. "We hope that the visa regime between our two countries will be lifted soon."

Back in 2008, Ankara lifted visa requirements for Azerbaijani citizens visiting Turkey for less than one month and urged Azerbaijan to reciprocate.

The move to extend the period for visa-free stays for Azerbaijani citizens may be an attempt to encourage Baku to lift the visa regime altogether.

Turkish media reported that the visa regime was on the agenda of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's visit to Baku in July.

Gas

A long-awaited Azerbaijani-Turkish gas agreement is expected to be signed in September this year, Hulusi Kilic told the press conference.

He said that representatives of the two countries' energy structures had held useful talks on the agreement during Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Baku visit.

"I think we will see this gas agreement signed between Turkey and Azerbaijan in September," the envoy said.

The agreement concerns the export via Turkey of Azerbaijani gas, produced under stage 2 of development of the Shah Deniz field.

The talks resumed after a break because of Turkey's 12 June general elections. They have hit a snag over jurisdictional issues and legal rights, executives from Azerbaijan's state oil company SOCAR told Turkish journalists in July.

Cooperation council

"Prime Minister Erdogan’s visit has historic significance and shows the great importance Turkey gives to Azerbaijan," the ambassador told the press conference.

The envoy said that the inaugural meeting of the High-Level Cooperation Council would be held by the end of the year in Turkey.

Agreement to set up the council was signed by Ilham Aliyev and Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Istanbul in September 2010 during a summit of Turkic-speaking states. The council had been expected to hold its inaugural sitting in Azerbaijan in January 2011.

Military

Military cooperation between Azerbaijan and Turkey is developing, Hulusi Kilic told the press conference.

Commenting on media reports that Turkey is interested in the joint use of Azerbaijan's Gabala radar station, at present leased to Russia, the ambassador said that Ankara had no such plans.

"The issue was not discussed during the visit," he said.

Ambassador Kilic said that Ankara was satisfied with President Aliyev’s recognition of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party or PKK as a terrorist organization.

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