Ljubljana, February 13, AZERTAC

President of the Slovenian National Assembly Milan Brglez has described Azerbaijan as a country with important position in the region as he was interviewed by AZERTAC. He highlighted the issues of Azerbaijani-Slovenian cooperation in a number of fields. The following is the text of the interview:

- How would you describe the current state of Azerbaijani-Slovenian interparliamentary relations?

- The interparliamentary ties between the two countries are developing. There are no unsolved issues between Azerbaijan and Slovenia. We can develop political relations even more. Slovenian-Azerbaijani interparliamentary friendship group is working to contribute to the development of our relations. This group is also closely cooperating with Slovenian-Azerbaijani Friendship Society.

- What is planned to be done to ensure further development of relations between our countries?

- We believe that the ties between Slovenia and Azerbaijan will be further expanded in a number of fields. The development of relations in the fields of information and communication technologies, agriculture, pharmaceutics, energy, tourism is important. There is a potential for deepening educational cooperation, as well as the exchange between the universities. The Erasmus Program can be useful in terms of carrying out student exchange.

- We would like to learn your opinion on cooperation within international organizations.

- Slovenia is member of a number of international organizations, including the European Union. Our countries` mutual support to each other in international organizations is very important. We should pay serious attention to this issue. The organization of reciprocal visits is also significant. The former president of Slovenian Parliament was in Azerbaijan in 2013. I am also planning to visit Azerbaijan in a short period of time.

- What can you say of Azerbaijan`s role in ensuring Europe`s energy security?

- Azerbaijan is a country which has an important position in the region. As you know, Europe needs to diversify energy supply routes. From this point of view Azerbaijan`s role is very important. Some stages should be passed to deliver these energy resources to Slovenia. Slovenia is going to participate in the large-scale energy projects being implemented in the region on the initiative and with participation of Azerbaijan. We are mostly interested in hydropower and technology fields. Slovenia doesn`t want to be dependent on one source. We are also interested in increasing trade with Azerbaijan. We will try to increase the level of economic cooperation.

- Could you please share your views on the Armenian-Azerbaijani Nagorno-Karabakh conflict?

- We consider that the peaceful settlement of the conflict is important. Every institutional opportunity must be used for this purpose. Especially, OSCE Minsk group`s activity is important in peaceful settlement of the dispute. Slovenia backs diplomatic settlement of all international conflicts.