Hikmat Hajiyev: Belt and Road Initiative to provide immense opportunities to bring China and Azerbaijan closer

12 April 2019 10:28 (UTC+04:00)

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Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) will provide immense opportunities to bring China and Azerbaijan closer, Hikmat Hajiyev, head of the Department of Foreign Policy Affairs of the Azerbaijani Presidential Administration told China Daily, Trend reports.

"The Belt and Road Initiative proposed by President Xi Jinping in 2013 has touched the hearts of the Azerbaijani people, as the restoration of the ancient Silk Road is for the benefit of the entire world, and the development and prosperity of all countries," he said.

Hajiyev believes the initiative will provide immense opportunities to bring China and Azerbaijan closer.

According to Hajiyev, Azerbaijan fully supports the initiative, and is building new bridges of cooperation and friendship. "We are looking forward to the second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation at the end of this month, and Azerbaijan will actively participate in this high-level event," he said.

"The point of the transportation network is to integrate it with the original countries," Hajiyev said, adding Azerbaijan has built a network of transportation including seaports, airports, railways and land roads.

"15,000 kilometers of land roads have been built in the past couple of years, and the country also constructed one of the biggest seaports in the Caspian Sea," Hajiyev said, adding all these are important pillars of the ancient Silk Road.

The Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway became operational on Oct 30, 2017, and aims to complete a transport corridor linking Azerbaijan to Turkey and Central Asia and China to Europe by rail. "It works as a major exporter and middle corridor under the Belt and Road Initiative, and Azerbaijan is also working on the East-West line and North-South Line, linking the railway systems of Iran and Russia."

Azerbaijan became a signatory to the Belt and Road Energy Partnership Declaration in October 2018.

The document emphasized that the Belt and Road Initiative will provide new opportunities for the international cooperation as an open and inclusive platform. By signing the Declaration, the signatory countries have also expressed their support for Building the Belt and Road Energy Partnership.

One Belt, One Road initiative was put forward by Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Azerbaijan expressed its support to the initiative when the country signed the Memorandum of Understanding on Joint Encouragement of the Establishment of Silk Way Economic Belt in 2015.

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