Azernews.Az

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has been elected Chairman of the Seventh General Assembly of the International Conference of Asian Political Parties (ICAPP), which opened in Baku on Thursday.

As a tradition, Chairman of the previous ICAPP General Assembly, Deputy Prime Minister of Cambodia symbolically passed the chairmanship to President Aliyev's representative, the head of Azerbaijani Presidential Administration, Ramiz Mehdiyev.

Ramiz Mehdiyev conveyed President Aliyev's greetings to the conference participants.

The ICAPP assembly is attended by about 200 representatives from 35 countries.

"The International Conference of Asian Political Parties becomes an authoritative organization of the modern world and contributes to addressing problems of the Asian region and the world," Deputy Chairman and Executive Secretary of the ruling Yeni (New) Azerbaijan Party, Ali Ahmedov said at the opening.

"The dynamic development of the Asian continent changes political and economic picture of the world. However, in parallel with economic development, poverty and bloody clashes are ongoing in a number of countries," Ahmedov said.

He said Azerbaijan has been an independent state for only 21 years, however, it has already achieved dynamic development, and the country's economy has tripled.

"At the same time, for already more than twenty years, 20 percent of the country's territories have been under the occupation, and Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict remains unresolved. The International Conference of Asian Political Parties should contribute to the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict," Ahmedov said.

Ahmedov called for establishing a youth forum and an organization of women members of various political parties within the ICAPP.