10:53

On February 1, the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, received the Minister of National Education of the Republic of Turkiye, Mahmut Ozer, and a group of members of the Grand National Assembly of Turkiye (TBMM) through video conferencing.

Axar.az reports that the reason for holding the meeting in video conference format is that the members of the Turkish delegation tested positive for COVID-19.

Hailing the successful development of friendly and brotherly relations between Azerbaijan and Turkiye in all areas, the head of state touched upon the importance of the visit of Mahmut Ozer and a group of members of the Grand National Assembly of Turkiye to the country and expressed hope that this visit will contribute to the expansion of the bilateral ties even further.

Noting that great achievements have been made in educational cooperation, President Ilham Aliyev said that the establishment of a joint Azerbaijan-Turkiye university, as agreed by the heads of state of the two countries, is of great importance.

Mahmut Ozer extended Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's greetings to the head of state.

President Ilham Aliyev thanked for the greetings and asked the minister to extend his greetings to Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Mahmut Ozer expressed his condolences to President Ilham Aliyev over the murder of the head of the security service, Orkhan Asgarov, during a terrorist act against the building of the embassy of the Republic of Azerbaijan in Tehran.

The head of state thanked for the condolences. President Ilham Aliyev emphasized that the terrorist was neutralized as a result of the heroism of another security employee of the embassy, and thus the attack of the armed person on other employees of the embassy and their family members was prevented. The head of state pointed out that this terrorist act is thoroughly investigated by Azerbaijan. President Ilham Aliyev underlined that despite the fact that the process of the terrorist act committed by that person in the building of the embassy took a long time, no serious measures were taken by the police and security forces of Iran.
Congratulating once again Azerbaijan on the Victory in the second Karabakh war, the Turkish minister said that the two countries' peoples have always stood by each other in the most difficult times.

Saying that relations between the two countries in the field of education have developed very rapidly in recent years, Mahmut Ozer noted that he is happy to share Turkiye's experience with Azerbaijan in this sphere.

During the meeting, the Turkish minister expressed gratitude to Azerbaijan, as a member state of the Organization of Turkic States, for its support in the process of obtaining observer status of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus with the organization at its Summit held in Samarkand.