The News – International, Pakistan
July 11 2008

Azerbaijan extends cooperation to Pakistan in energy field

Friday, July 11, 2008

ISLAMABAD: Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev has extended full
cooperation to Pakistan in the field of energy, as Azerbaijan is a
major exporter of oil and gas. He expressed these views while
receiving the visiting Pakistani parliamentary delegation, headed by
Senator Mushahid Hussain, here in Baku, said a press statement
received here on Thursday.

The Azeri president thanked Pakistan for its support to Azerbaijan on
the issue of Nagorno Karabakh with Armenia. He strongly supported the
position of Pakistan on Kashmir. Ilham Aliyev urged the need for
strengthening the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC).

In response to an invitation from Senator Mushahid Hussain, the Azeri
president, who is also the head of the ruling New Azerbaijan Party,
agreed to send a party delegation to the International Conference of
the Asian Political Parties (ICAPP), which would be held in Islamabad
on October 24-26.

The delegation also met Azeri Prime Minister Artur Rasizade, who said
the bilateral economic ties should be strengthened and this would be
done at the forthcoming meeting of the Joint Ministerial Commission in
Baku this year.

In a meeting with Azeri Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov, Mushahid
briefed him on the foreign policy of Pakistan with reference to
Afghanistan and India. He said Pakistan was being blamed unfairly for
mistakes made by the Western forces in Afghanistan, who were looking
for a scapegoat.

He added that Pakistan was not responsible for the growth of narcotics
or bad governance, or corruption, or collapse of law and order in
Afghanistan. These problems arose when the Western forces, while
ignoring Afghanistan, decided to invade Iraq, he said.

He urged the need for giving a "healing touch" to Afghanistan and not
to alienate the Afghan population through indiscriminate use of
force. He referred to the burden of the Afghan refugees that Pakistan
was carrying on its own.

The delegation comprised Senators Wasim Sajjad, Nisar Memon, Maulana
Sami-ul-Haq, Talha Mahmood, Latif Khan Khosa, Tahir Hussain Mashhadi,
Naeem Hussain Chattha and Additional Secretary Senate Iftikhar Ullah
Babar.