Azerbaijani Foreign Minister: Azerbaijan, EU traditionally establish good and close cooperation

Traditionally Azerbaijan and EU establish good and close cooperation, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov told in interview to EU Reporter in anticipation of EU-Azerbaijan Cooperation Council.
“We together get on annual EU-Azerbaijan Council. It is a traditional meeting with the EU countries and, particularly, this time it will be held not only with Azerbaijan, but also with Georgia and Armenia,” the minister said.
He said, the EU and Azerbaijan achieved positive results on some issues, some of them need to be achieved within negotiations.
Mammadyarov said negotiations within the Council also touched military-political, security elements, economic development, energy issues, human rights and democracy building.
“All of these, as well as visa facilitation are part of our constant dialogue with the EU. The last round of negotiations on visa facilitation was in Baku and we agreed that the next round is going to be in Brussels, probably within the first three month of the next year,” the minister said.
Mammadyarov noted that the sides made progress on this issue.
“On the visa facilitation there are still few issues, particularly readmission, but I believe that the next year’s round is going to be the last one,” the minister said.
During the interview Mammadyarov also discussed the issue of energy cooperation with the EU.
“I don’t like the politicization of energy projects but always understand that energy is part of policy,” the minister said.
“The volumes of the gas which will come from the Azerbaijani sector of Caspian Sea will be much less, comparing with volume of South Stream, because this project is much bigger than Trans Anatolian pipeline, for example, ” he said.
Nabucco is another intrigue which will be solved next year, because there are still two options in which directions it will go, Mammadyarov said.
“One direction is Nabucco West up to the Austrian Baumgarten and the other is TAP which will go to Italy,” he said.
The decision will be made by companies, parts of consortium, and the decision should be made next year, Mammadyarov said.
Mammadyarov said energy is the key element of cooperation between the EU and Azerbaijan.
“The President of the European Commission, Jose Manuel Barroso was in Baku. The President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and the President Barroso signed a very significant document of strategic partnership between the EU and Azerbaijan with regard of support of the so-called Southern Corridor and energy cooperation,” the minister said.
He said apart from energy projects, overall development in the region and the strategic partnership between Azerbaijan and EU can be important not only for Azerbaijan, but for the EU and its member states as well.
“So far, the negotiations in this regard with the European Commission are going on. I can tell you that after the signing of agreement on Trans Anatolian Pipeline, now we recognize that by 2018 the natural gas from the Caspian Sea is going to come to the borders of the EU, namely Bulgaria,” Mammadyarov said.