Baku, February 24, AZERTAC

Ilham Aliyev, President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, held an expanded meeting with Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif, Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, on February 24.

The President of Azerbaijan addressed the meeting.

Speech by President Ilham Aliyev

- My dear brother, Mr. Prime Minister, dear members of the delegation, welcome to Azerbaijan.

I am very glad to host my dear brother once again in our country, now on a state visit. I have great memories of my state visit to Pakistan last year and the hospitality shown to me and my delegation. We are very grateful for that.

Mr. Prime Minister and I have already covered a substantial part of our bilateral agenda in our meeting today, and now we will continue with the delegations.

I'm sure that the visit will strengthen the brotherly ties between our countries. We will continue to support each other in all international institutions. We agreed on our very ambitious economic agenda and today discussed practical projects for our economic cooperation, including investment opportunities. We have already given instructions to our teams to work actively within one month to prepare documents for signing with respect to Azerbaijani investments to Pakistan. During my state visit to Pakistan, I officially announced that Azerbaijan is ready to invest a minimum of $2 billion in different projects in Pakistan.

We already got the list of these projects relatively recently, and our teams are evaluating. So, my brother and I set a target of one month to finalize everything and receive a report on it.

Our relations are really important not only for our peoples but also for the regions we represent. Seeing these brotherly ties between Pakistan and Azerbaijan is a good example of partnership between the two brotherly Muslim countries. We always support each other in international institutions, strongly support the territorial integrity and sovereignty of our countries, and have, as I said, a very ambitious investment agenda ahead of us. I'm sure that our work on all the issues, and many other areas we will cover today, will continue during the Business Forum and lead to a closer partnership between us. We need to bring our economic partnership to the level of the political field, which will be a good demonstration of mutual political will.

Once again, my dear brother, welcome. I wish you a pleasant stay in Baku.

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Then, the Prime Minister of Pakistan delivered a speech.

Speech by Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif

- Thank you, my very dear brother, President Ilham Aliyev, honorable members of your cabinet, and honorable members of my delegation. Excellency, thank you very much for your very warm invitation to me.

And here we are in your beautiful city of Baku, which is evergreen, but today it is covered by a blanket of snow, and it looks even more beautiful. This reminds me of your very generous contribution as your team of horticulture experts is in Islamabad. They have done a remarkable job of beautifying Islamabad, which is, Alhamdulillah, a beautiful city, but your team's vision is remarkable, and I thank you for your gesture.

Your Excellency, your last visit to Pakistan strengthened our bilateral relations immensely. The people of Pakistan were hugely inspired and happy during your visit. I think the hearts of the people of Azerbaijan and Pakistan beat as one. I say this with all sincerity at my command. You have always been a great friend of Pakistan. You love the people of Pakistan.

Similarly, all governments in Pakistan and all political parties in Pakistan have one thing in common, and that is our friendship and brotherhood with Azerbaijan, with you, and with the people of Azerbaijan. I would have loved to visit Shusha tomorrow but because of, you know, extreme weather, I would be very happy to visit that place when we attend the conference in July this year. Then, we can certainly visit those beautiful places.

Your Excellency, during our one-on-one meeting this morning, we had a wonderful and productive discussion.