Elmar Mammadyarov: Ladies and gentlemen! As you may know, my dear friend and brother Mr. Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, the Foreign Minister of the Republic of Türkiye is paying the official visit to Azerbaijan.

It should be noted that it is a pleasure that our Heads of State and the ministers after the elections make their first visits to Türkiye and Azerbaijan, respectively, and we commend it.

Although we had been talking a few weeks ago during the NATO summit in Brussels, today we also hold one-on-one and extended meetings. We discussed ways of how to further revitalize and utilize the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, and have exchanged views on this issue. TANAP has already started operating. We also went through the issues of continuation of cooperation in this regard. We exchanged views on issues of bilateral and multilateral agenda during the meeting. We touched upon issues of cooperation within international organizations. Mevlüt Bey was once the head of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe and today the head of the delegation of Azerbaijan to PACE, MP Samad Seyidov was attended the meeting. We conducted extensive discussions on the working mechanisms within this organization.

Q&A Session:

Question: Ruslan Rahimov, Anadolu Agency: Mr. Minister, you talked about the Baku-Tibilisi-Kars railway. At the end of last year this route was launched. What is the current situation in this line? You told about expanding, can you please explain, for example, when transportation of passengers can be carried out?

Elmar Mammadyarov: We had very thorough discussions today on the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, including the question of transportation of cargo to Afghanistan. As you may know, Afghanistan is an important country and it has difficulty in connectivity. BTK railway is the shortest route and is a reliable way to connect to Central Asia and Afghanistan.

Through the BTK railway we discussed the transportation of cargo to Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Afghanistan. Of course, Türkiye and Azerbaijan should strengthen their efforts together. There also, must be a passenger transportation , but for this purpose new wagons and locomotives should be purchased. We hope that passengers will also be able to use it.

Question: Sevinj Valehqizi, APA TV: Mr. Minister, Is the meeting with your Armenian counterpart expected? Is the presidents' meeting expected, and if yes when? Thanks.

Elmar Mammadyarov: Yes, it is planned. In Brussels, we had discussions about 4 hours. Of course, the Armenian side needs time to learn more about the situation and review the documents. But it is very likely that we will hold a meeting in September. Together with the co-chairs, we came to a conclusion that we may have a meeting within the framework of the meeting of UN General Assembly. There was a proposal on this. The meeting may also take place before this meeting. On behalf of my side I said that the Azerbaijani side supports the continuation of substantive and intensive negotiations. I am ready to hold a meeting in the existing format and framework. However, for Azerbaijan it is important to focus on result-oriented negotiations, rather than the negotiation for the sake of it. Regarding high-level meetings, for example, at the presidential level or at the level of prime ministers, the Armenian side asked for some time to figure out how and to what extent the negotiations will be held.

Thank you for your attention.