OREANDA-NEWS. July 1, 2009. Upon completion of a ceremony of signing Azerbaijan-Russia documents, Presidents Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan and Dmitry Medvedev of Russia gave a joint press conference.

In his statement for the media outlets, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev said that there is a high level of political interaction between the two states.

“Various economic projects are being successfully implemented. Despite, a slight drop in trade turnover driven by the world financial crisis, the dynamism and structure of the trade turnover allow us to say that it is a temporary obstacle, which will be overcome. With the documents signed today, I am sure, we will sea a dramatic increase in trade turnover next year,” said President Ilham Aliyev

“Today, we laid a good basis for effective cooperation in the gas field. Today, Gasprom and SOCAR signed a deal which marks a new chapter in our relations. I think, this will be very successful and mutually beneficial cooperation, which will fully meet interests of Russia and Azerbaijan”

“Also, we forged ahead today, took very important step to finally delimitate borders between our states. We agreed principles, which will be the basis for moving ahead and signing documents”

“Of course, today, we discussed resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. We are grateful to Russia and personally, to President for active participation in the process of resolution. A meeting between Presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia, which was held earlier this month with the attendance of the President of Russia, created a good atmosphere for continuing talks. We hope Russia will continue to participate in resolution of this complicated issue both as a mediator and a neighbor,” added President Ilham Aliyev.

President of Russia Dmirty Medvedev said “the fact that we meet frequently will contribute to developing strategic ties between Russia and Azerbaijan”.

He noted “our countries are major energy suppliers. We worked and continue to work in oil sector, but now we open gas direction. I think that this is a good beginning towards improving contacts in this direction and involving in mutually beneficial cooperation in gas sector. A document we signed today is a good beginning”.

The Russian leader said “as regards to other areas of cooperation, we have done a lot over the past years. Last year we signed a new strategic document – Agreement on friendship and partnership. This document is being executed and what we signed today is concretization of that document.

The Russian leader noted several documents were signed today including an agreement on the Caspian Sea, diplomatic issues, real estate and memorandum on main principles of completing delimitation of the state border.

Touching upon the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, President Dmitry Medvedev said Russia would continue to contribute to resolution of the dispute.