President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev received leader of the faction of Liberal Democratic Party of Russia in the State Duma of the Russian Federation Leonid Slutsky.

Speaking at the meeting President Ilham Aliyev said: Dear Leonid Eduardovich, I am very pleased to welcome you. You are welcome! Your visit is of great importance. I am confident that it will make a great contribution to the strengthening of the friendly and partnership relations between our countries.

As you may know, the President of the Russian Federation paid a state visit to Azerbaijan last month, and it gave a great impetus to the development of our bilateral relations in all areas. As you know, there are extensive inter-parliamentary relations between our legislators. The intergovernmental commission is working successfully and humanitarian cooperation is developing fast. All these and many other issues were discussed during the visit of the President of Russia to Azerbaijan. We reaffirmed with satisfaction the progressive and dynamic nature of our relations. And of course, inter-party relations between the political forces of our countries are also an important factor of our interaction. You are heading one of the leading political parties of the Russian Federation, which enjoys great authority in all regions of the Russian Federation. The successful results of election campaigns demonstrated by representatives of your party suggests the great authority of your political force as an important factor in the political system of the Russian Federation.

We, of course, observe all this with great interest and joy. I wish you and the party you are leading continued success. Of course, as the head of the foreign policy direction of the State Duma, you are also familiar with the successes in the Russian-Azerbaijani track, because we will discuss these and other issues in detail today and outline ways of further cooperation.

And lastly, I would like to express my gratitude to you for finding time to visit the Karabakh region of Azerbaijan despite your busy schedule. The city of Shusha was among the settlements you have visited. This, of course, gives your visit a special significance. I am sure that the Azerbaijani public, first of all the former IDPs, will appreciate your decision to visit the Karabakh region.

You are welcome again.

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Leonid Slutsky said:

- Dear Ilham Heydarovich, it is a great honor and an auspicious occasion for me to be visiting our brotherly Azerbaijan every time, meet with you and note with deep satisfaction the progress Azerbaijan is registering on the way of development of national economy. You are successfully implementing what Heydar Aliyevich bequeathed to you. The same applies to social policy, your closeness to each family and every person, the most serious humanitarian projects realized in the country every year. For me, it was a significant event to realize my much-coveted dream of visiting Shusha, the cultural capital of Azerbaijan. I can say that the Karabakh region is recovering at an extraordinary pace. There are already two beautiful international airports – Fuzuli and Zangilan, while a third airport is also under construction at a rapid pace. Shusha today is a major construction site, restoration of its historical sites is in full swing. I am happy to have visited Shusha. It was a landmark event for me. This is why I specifically came here a day earlier. I would like to say a special word with regard to certain countries of the region that attribute to themselves, at least in part, the success of the anti-terror operation, the operation as a result of which Karabakh returned home to Azerbaijan. After the national poverty reduction program was successfully developed, after Azerbaijan became an energy-independent state, another and perhaps the main precept of your great father, the founder of the modern state of Azerbaijan, Heydar Aliyevich Aliyev, whose memory we honor in Russia, was realized. I will visit his grave before leaving for Moscow, following this tradition. I am talking about Karabakh's return home. There are no merits of any country here except for Azerbaijan, except for the Azerbaijani leadership, the Azerbaijani people, the Azerbaijani Armed Forces. This is not only a task of national importance, it is a task of stability in the South Caucasus, a task of historic proportions, and it has been successfully solved.

The creation of new jobs, including science-intensive clusters, is underway in the Karabakh region of Azerbaijan at an accelerated pace today. And just as some people once couldn’t imagine the swift return of Karabakh, some may not fully grasp today what Karabakh will become in just a few years. But I saw with my own eyes yesterday that it would be a prosperous and fertile land again, and cooperation between Russian and Azerbaijani infrastructure companies, the implementation of infrastructure projects would also take place in the Karabakh region in the interests of the people, to which all of the many years of your activity as the leader of modern Azerbaijan have been dedicated, dear Ilham Heydarovich.

It is also significant for me that our respected and beloved Polad Bulbuloglu was with me yesterday. For 18 years, he was the Minister of Culture of Azerbaijan, and for 18 years worked as your Ambassador to Russia, worthily representing the foreign policy line of the President of Azerbaijan in the Russian direction, as the dean of the diplomatic corps in Moscow. And now he worthily represents the Karabakh region, where his father is from, in the Milli Majlis. Yesterday we visited the historical home of Bulbul, where the presidents of Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Belarus, many other political and public figures have also visited before. So it has been a doubly significant visit for me. Of course, we will discuss a significant number of issues that are topical in our bilateral agenda, including, of course, the parliamentary diplomacy dimension, which is developing very successfully together with the Milli Majlis.

After visiting Shusha yesterday, I would like to say again, dear Ilham Heydarovich, that I congratulate all those who, just like me, live with Azerbaijan in their hearts, including those who live far beyond the borders of the Azerbaijani state. I congratulate them on the return of Karabakh home. Karabakh is Azerbaijan!

President Ilham Aliyev: Thank you very much!