PM Garibashvili Visits Azerbaijan
As part of his visit to Azerbaijan at the invitation by the President of Azeribaijan Ilham Aliev, Prime Minister Garibashvili addressed the United Nations Special Programme for the Economies of Central Asia (SPECA) in Baku and emphasized the importance of Azerbaijan as a valuable neighbor and strategic partner for Georgia. He expressed pride in the strong and friendly relations between the two nations, stressing that they are currently at the highest level.
The Prime Minister highlighted the region’s growing role as a vital transit and logistics hub. He specifically mentioned the “Middle Corridor” as an alternative route for East-West trade connecting Europe and Asia.
Prime Minister Garibashvili emphasized the strategic importance of promoting connectivity, noting Georgia’s favorable geographic location and attractive business environment. He underscored Georgia’s existing role in East-West connectivity and highlighted its overall positive economic, business and institutional outlook.
The Prime Minister highlighted a new project for the construction of the deep sea port of Anaklia with a target capacity of 100 million tonnes per year. He also noted the joint efforts on the Black Sea undersea power cable project, which was signed in Bucharest by the leaders of Georgia, Azerbaijan, Hungary and Romania. Garibashvili expressed optimism about the importance of the project for both the region and Europe.
Prime Minister Garibashvili expressed a keen interest in strengthening ties with the Central Asian region and emphasized the positive momentum of recent years. He highlighted “the Georgian government’s primary goals of maintaining peace, ensuring stability, and promoting economic development”. Despite global and regional instability due to security challenges, Garibashvili credited the government’s “pragmatic and thoughtful foreign policy”, along with “sound economic strategies” for successfully achieving these goals.
“We are also actively pursuing integration with the European Union. In the last 10 years we have signed an Association Agreement, free trade with Europe, the regime of free movement, the regime of visa-free movement with the European Union, last year we received the European perspective and in December we are waiting for the candidate status,” the Prime Minister noted.
He noted that he had had “a very successful visit to China” in July this year, which had taken relations to a new level, signing a strategic partnership agreement that “opens up new opportunities not only for our countries but for the entire region”.
Meeting with the President of Azerbaijan
According to the government administration, Prime Minister Garibashvili also met with the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliev.
During the meeting, the historical and friendly relations between Azerbaijan and Georgia were emphasized and the key role of Azerbaijan as a major trade partner of Georgia was underlined. Discussions focused on strategic cooperation in trade, economy, energy, transport and logistics.
According to the Government Administration, During the meeting key projects were discussed including the development of the Middle Corridor, which includes railway modernization, port development, and road construction, as well as the East-West High-Speed Motorway and the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars Railway, which are expected to improve regional transportation links. The development of the Black Sea undersea cable for green energy to the European Union was also highlighted.
The meeting also touched on regional security issues, with Prime Minister Garibashvili expressing hope that Azerbaijan would soon sign a peace agreement with Armenia.
This post is also available in: ქართული (Georgian) Русский (Russian)
