Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that Ankara believes a format of trilateral cooperation involving Turkey, Azerbaijan and Russia may be established.
"Implementation of major projects in the region, in particular a New Silk Road project, will enable Azerbaijan to become a transit center, a hub in the region. To implement these projects, Azerbaijan and Turkey intend to cooperate not only in a bilateral but also in a trilateral format with other countries," he said at the press conference after talks with the Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov.
"In particular, we seek to form an Azerbaijan-Turkey-Kazakhstan trilateral format. We also believe an Azerbaijan-Turkey-Russia trilateral format is possible," the head of the Turkish ministry said, adding that these opportunities are being discussed.
He called held in Moscow on the eve of the Russian-Turkish political consultations very useful and fruitful.
"We believe that yesterday's meeting at the level of the deputy foreign ministers was very useful and fruitful," TASS cited Cavusoglu as saying.
According to the Minister, "such contacts are quite normal" to restore relations after a seven-month break.
"After normalization of relations, we are discussing the return of the old days in the tourism and trade industries," he noted. The Foreign Minister said that during the meeting in Moscow they discussed the issues of cooperation in the tourism sector, as well as the resumption of charter flights. "The meeting of the economy ministers of the two countries is planned in the future. We also are working on the organization of the meeting between Erdogan and Putin before the G20 summit," Cavusoglu said.
At a press conference in Baku the head of the Turkish Foreign Ministry also thanked the President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and his counterpart Elmar Mammadyarov for their contribution to the normalization of relations between Russia and Turkey.
A leading analyst of the National Energy Security, a lecturer at the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation, Igor Yushkov, speaking with a correspondent of Vestnik Kavkaza, recognized that the harmonization of the sides' positions on economic projects is always helpful.
"Any dialogue will only benefit us, but so far it is unclear what exactly Turkey offers us. For example, in the field of energy it could be a joint project of a new gas pipeline to Europe. Azerbaijan is actively building the Southern Gas Corridor, and it would be advantageous for us to join the project, creating a formation like the Turkish stream, so that the gas heading from Russia to Turkey could get into the pipe with the Azerbaijani gas. In such circumstances, the Europeans will not be able to put a spoke in Gazprom's wheel, because our gas will be supplied by an international pipeline," he said.
At the same time, the expert stressed that Cavusoglu's statement should be seen as a political one. "Turkey wants to fully return to the Russian market, and it is not an accident that there were such statements. Therefore, it proposed to cooperate with Azerbaijan, which is also actively supplying agricultural products to replace European production. But it is also possible that the Turks simply want to stress once again that they are happy to restore relations with Russia, because it helps to develop their economy," Igor Yushkov noted.
The political scientist Rovshan Ibragimov, in turn, said that Azerbaijan is interested in such a trilateral format of economic cooperation, especially since the trilateral contacts is one of the standard schemes of the Republic's work with other countries. "For example, I mean such formats as Turkey - Georgia - Azerbaijan, Azerbaijan - Turkey - Iran and Azerbaijan - Turkey - Turkmenistan. Given the experience, which was formed on the basis of these relations, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu expressed this idea. If we remember that in the region are now being implemented. project "New Silk Road", it becomes clear that cooperation in the transport direction is the most promising," the expert said.
According to him, Cavusoglu's proposal is only an initial stage, because in general there are many areas for cooperation between the three countries. "Azerbaijan's attitude to these two countries is well-known. These relations are of strategic nature with Turkey and partnership with Russia. Even when relations between Moscow and Ankara were complicated, Baku has attempted to improve them. There is even an opportunity to prevent possible adverse developments in the contacts between the countries," Rovshan Ibrahgimov believes.
