Azerbaijan seeks to host OIC’s 2013 summit
Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov
delivered an address at a session of the foreign ministers of the
Organization for Islamic Conference (OIC) in Dushanbe, Tajikistan
on Tuesday.
Mammadyarov said Azerbaijan had offered last year to hold an OIC summit in Baku in 2013, calling on other Islamic states to back the proposal.
Speaking about Armenia’s aggression against Azerbaijan, the minister extended profound gratitude to the Islamic community and the OIC secretary-general for their extensive support in eliminating the consequences of this aggression.
Mammadyarov also said Baku was joining other speakers’ congratulatory messages over the nuclear enrichment deal reached by Turkey, Iran and Brazil.
Further, Mammadyarov said that Azerbaijan is an integral part of the Islamic civilization and was the first former Soviet Islamic republic to have applied for OIC membership in 1991. He said developing broad relations with the OIC was one of the top priorities in Azerbaijan’s foreign policy and bears strategic importance.
The OIC foreign ministers session, which will last three days, is attended by 80 delegations of OIC member states, representatives of observer countries, and international and regional organizations. The agenda includes issues pertaining to the escalation in Palestinian-Israeli conflict, turning the Middle East into a nuclear-free zone, as well as the situation in Iraq and Somalia.
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Al-Muallem, whose country chaired the 36th session last year, called on all OIC member states to support the initiative of turning the Middle East into a zone free of nuclear weapons, and also pay attention to the situation in the Gaza Strip, which he said has been under Israel’s humanitarian blockade for over three years.
"We can't remain indifferent to what is happening in Gaza, where basic human rights are being violated," Al-Muallem said.
Mammadyarov said Azerbaijan had offered last year to hold an OIC summit in Baku in 2013, calling on other Islamic states to back the proposal.
Speaking about Armenia’s aggression against Azerbaijan, the minister extended profound gratitude to the Islamic community and the OIC secretary-general for their extensive support in eliminating the consequences of this aggression.
Mammadyarov also said Baku was joining other speakers’ congratulatory messages over the nuclear enrichment deal reached by Turkey, Iran and Brazil.
Further, Mammadyarov said that Azerbaijan is an integral part of the Islamic civilization and was the first former Soviet Islamic republic to have applied for OIC membership in 1991. He said developing broad relations with the OIC was one of the top priorities in Azerbaijan’s foreign policy and bears strategic importance.
The OIC foreign ministers session, which will last three days, is attended by 80 delegations of OIC member states, representatives of observer countries, and international and regional organizations. The agenda includes issues pertaining to the escalation in Palestinian-Israeli conflict, turning the Middle East into a nuclear-free zone, as well as the situation in Iraq and Somalia.
Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Al-Muallem, whose country chaired the 36th session last year, called on all OIC member states to support the initiative of turning the Middle East into a zone free of nuclear weapons, and also pay attention to the situation in the Gaza Strip, which he said has been under Israel’s humanitarian blockade for over three years.
"We can't remain indifferent to what is happening in Gaza, where basic human rights are being violated," Al-Muallem said.
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