Azernews.Az

By Nazrin Gadimova

Azerbaijani Minister of Culture and Tourism Abulfaz Garayev has stressed the importance of increasing the number of people reading books and encouraging youth to go to libraries.

"If we manage to accomplish that, libraries will continue to exist," Garayev said at the 27th annual meeting of the Conference of European National Libraries (CENL), which is underway in Baku with the participation of the heads of European libraries.

Garayev emphasized that there is complete freedom of the Internet in Azerbaijan.

"People get all of the news from the Internet. But at the same time it is very important to increase the number of people reading books. The main goal for us is to attract the younger generation to libraries," the minister said.

Otherwise, he warned, the youth will prefer discos to libraries.

"We should take into account that without books, no country can develop. Special attention should be paid to books as an integral part of the issue of culture," Garayev said.

He said Azerbaijan has about 4,000 libraries, and the problems facing the libraries around the world are essentially the same.

According to Garayev, the government is working to improve the functioning of libraries in Azerbaijan.

"One can say today that large libraries in all regions of the country have been provided with digital devices and linked into a single network. Soon small libraries will be integrated into the network as well," he added.

In turn, the head of the National Library of Azerbaijan Kerim Tahirov stressed the importance of the CENL meeting, saying it coincides with the 90th anniversary of the national library.

He also said that since 2003 Azerbaijan has been participating in the activities of CENL and is ready to further host them in the future.

CENL Chair Bruno Racine, speaking at the event, said that cooperation agreements should be signed between CENL and libraries.

"Almost all libraries have a budget problem. We should try to solve this problem," Racine said, adding that discussions should be held on the issue.

Earlier, Racine and Vice President of the Eurasian Association of Libraries Gulisa Balabekova were received by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.

Also, the third Baku International Book Fair, dedicated to the 90th anniversary of national leader Heydar Aliyev, is underway in Azerbaijan's capital. The book fair, which is being held on September 23-25 and was organized by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, envisions holding up to 100 presentations and the participation of 125 publishing houses from 25 countries, including those of Latvia, Romania, Belarus, Kuwait, Iran and Tajikistan.