President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has received credentials of newly-appointed Ambassador Extraord?nary and Plenipotentiary of the Italian Republic Claudio Taffuri, Azertag has reported.

The newly appointed Italian ambassador presented his credentials to President Ilham Aliyev.

Welcoming the ambassador, President Ilham Aliyev said:

-Welcome Mr. Ambassador and Madame. I am very glad to see you. I hope you will have good time in Azerbaijan. You will spent several years here. I am sure you will witness from the first days that the people to people contact between our population is growing and people in Azerbaijan know that Italy is a friendly country. This is important and you know all the history of our bilateral relations, all the important milestones, and of course, signing of documents on strategic partnership actually reflected the substance of our cooperation. This really elevates the level of partnership to a very high level. And we see practical implementation of this important political development, because it’s obvious that without strong political ties we wouldn’t be able to achieve already a big progress in different areas. Political dialogue and strong political ties lay the foundation for cooperation in different areas and many Italian companies are actively working in Azerbaijan, implementing important projects for our country. They are large-scale projects worth billions of dollars and there are more opportunities in the future. Of course, we started with the energy cooperation and oil supply from Azerbaijan makes Italy our biggest trading partner. But I hope that we will find other areas in order to expand our trade turnover. Then, of course, the implementation of the Southern Gas Corridor created absolutely new format for cooperation, long-term cooperation. Italy becomes one of the major markets for our natural gas, and oil. These are really important achievements in our bilateral cooperation. Southern Gas Corridor is really a historical project of historical importance and big complexity. But now I think after all this have been accomplished, we need to look to the future and the friendly countries need to find new areas of practical cooperation. I am sure that it will happen because Italian companies are among the first foreign companies which started to work with respect to the reconstruction of the liberated territories. You know that the projects, projects of big importance, of symbolic importance for Azerbaijan and also projects of economic development and infrastructure. In energy sector, power generation, already Italian companies are involved in the process of reconstruction of destroyed hydropower generations, in other areas, in areas of manufacture and production. So this really demonstrates that we are strategic partners not only on paper, in documents but in reality. I am sure that you will be very active in Azerbaijan in order to promote more our bilateral cooperation in different areas so that we have a long-term sustainable, successful bilateral cooperation. So, welcome once again.

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The newly appointed Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Italy to Azerbaijan Claudio Taffuri conveyed the greetings of Italian President Sergio Mattarella to the head of state.

President Ilham Aliyev thanked for the greetings of Sergio Mattarella and asked the ambassador to convey his greetings to the Italian President.

Describing Azerbaijan and Italy as friendly and strategic partners, Ambassador Claudio Taffuri said he was pleased with his appointment as Ambassador to the country and said he would spare no effort to further strengthen bilateral relations during his tenure. Recalling the state visit of President Ilham Aliyev to Italy in 2020, the Ambassador said there were great opportunities for the further expansion of cooperation between the two countries in political, economic, trade, humanitarian and other fields. Ambassador Claudio Taffuri stressed that his country was closely involved in the reconstruction of the liberated territories of Azerbaijan, noting that this activity would be continued in the future too.