ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and Azerbaijan agreed on Wednesday to hold fast-track conversations on energy collaboration, renewed their commitment to consolidate bilateral engagement in several areas of cooperation, and reviewed the progress of colorful ongoing enterprise aimed at promoting connectivity, trade, and investment.
During the meeting, held in Kazakhstan’s capital Astana, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif underscored the need for fostering close cooperation on energy, a high-precedence area for his government.
He nominated Minister of State for Petroleum Musadik Malik, who visited the Azeri capital Baku last month, as the focal person for bilateral energy cooperation.
Mr. Sharif met Azeri President Ilham Aliyev on the sidelines of the sixth Summit of the Conference for Interaction and Confidence structure Measures in Asia(CICA), an intergovernmental forum comprising 27 countries from across Asia.
The two-day peak began on Wednesday in Astana, where the premier arrived before in the day, along with Defence Minister Khawaja Asif, Information Minister Marriyum Aurangzeb, Mr. Malik, and other government officers.
Before his departure, Mr. Sharif twittered that he believed the peak “is able of shaping a new configuration of profitable cooperation and security in Asia through lesser connectivity”.
“As the world faces the prospect of a recession fuelled by an increase in energy and food prices, there’s a lesser need to promote engagement and understanding to form palm-palm hookups. Climate-convinced disasters call for synergized sweats for mutually salutary issues,” he said.
According to PM Office, the two heads of state reviewed bilateral ties with a view to perfecting cooperation in trade, investment, education, information technology, security, husbandry, connectivity, and energy. They also bandied indigenous and global issues of common interest.
The PM also briefed Mr. Aliyev on his government’s sweats to rehabilitate the millions of flood tide-affected people in Pakistan and restore their livelihoods damaged by the unknown natural disaster convinced by climate change.
