According to the news service of the Iranian economy ministry (shada.ir), Iran's Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance Farhad Dejpasand met with his Azerbaijani counterpart Shahin Mustafayev on Saturday during which they said that number and volume of Iranian companies operating in Azerbaijan have increased by 34%, while the number of Iranian companies operating in Azerbaijan was announced to be 1371.
The Iranian economy minister said the meeting was talking place with the aim of following up on the agreements signed between the two sides during a recent meeting of joint economic commission.
Dejpasand said that the during the recent meeting of joint economic commission in Baku, the two countries reached very good agreements, a large part of which is being implemented and is being pursued by both sides, while the implementation of the remaining part was being discussed and agreed upon in today’s meeting.
He Iranian Minister of Economic Affairs and Finance described making preparations and intensifying efforts on issues capable of being discussed at the upcoming trilateral summit of Iran, Azerbaijan and Russia in Sochi as the next aim of today's meeting, saying "fortunately, we had very close point of views with the Azerbaijani side on this issue as well."
Noting that there are good infrastructure and investment projects being implemented by the two countries, Dejpasand pointed to the implementation of Azerbaijan's rail project in Iran as one of the successful projects, which has made considerable progress so far.
He noted that despite all restrictions, the trend of economic activity of the two countries is well developing, pointing to the construction of joint automobile and pharmaceutical factories, cooperation in the field of agricultural industries, transfer of knowledge and technical experience, the transfer of energy and electricity, transit of goods etc as some joint projects being carried out by the two neighboring countries.
The Azeri minister, for his part said that the bilateral relations between Iran and Azerbaijan are expanding, stressing that developing Tehran-Baku relations will further help regional security.
Shahin Mustafayev said that he is authorized by his country’s president to implement signed bilateral MoUs and remove probable obstacles on the way of their implementation.
He noted that one of the areas of cooperation between the two countries is facilitating trade and transit of goods and livestock, in particular the follow-up on the International North–South Transport Corridor (INSTC), adding the volume of transit of goods through this INSTC increased by eight times in 2018 compared to the year before, and it increased by 53% in the first six months of this year.
KI/4683792