Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev on Sunday commended the cooperation between the armed forces of his country and Türkiye.
As he received Turkish National Defense Minister Yaşar Güler at the Zagulba Presidential Residence in the capital, Baku, Aliyev said that Güler had made great contributions to the partnership of the two countries’ armed forces.
“The cooperation of the Azerbaijani and Turkish Armed Forces is at an excellent level,” he said.
Recalling how President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan visited Azerbaijan during his first overseas tour after being reelected this May, Aliyev underlined the importance of a new air force central command post inaugurated during that visit.
For his part, Güler said that the sacrifices and heroism of Azerbaijani soldiers in the liberation of the formerly occupied territories of the country will never be forgotten, referring to a fall 2020 war in the Karabakh region against Baku’s neighbor Armenia.
Meanwhile, Güler also met with his Azerbaijani counterpart Zakir Hasanov and discussed regional security and cooperation issues.
Hasanov emphasized the high level of Azerbaijan-Türkiye military cooperation and the importance of continuing work to boost it further.
Güler said the strategic alliance between Ankara and Baku was based on friendship and brotherhood while expressing his pleasure at making his first visit abroad as national defense minister to Azerbaijan, a brotherly country.
At the meeting, the two ministers also discussed the development of military, military-technical and military-training cooperation between Türkiye and Azerbaijan, as well as regional security issues and mutual interest.
Ankara and Baku regularly conduct joint military drills to bolster coordination and test combat abilities.
Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov was in Ankara last month to meet his Turkish counterpart Hakan Fidan, who reiterated Türkiye’s commitment to supporting the resolution of issues with Armenia, particularly regarding the Lachin road.
A “blockade” on the said road, the only land route giving Armenia access to Karabakh, has been a source of strain between the ex-Soviet republics since last year, drawing the mediation efforts of multiple parties, including the European Union and the United Nations.
Additionally, Türkiye and Azerbaijan are connected by the Trans-Anatolian gas pipeline, which transports Azeri gas to Europe. The sides have this year agreed to increase the pipeline’s capacity, bringing Türkiye into a hub position. They also plan to open and build a railway through the Zangezur corridor land route in South Caucasus, originally a part of Azerbaijan but given to Armenia in the 1920s, which deprived Azerbaijan of a direct link to its exclave Nakhchivan.
