Azerbaijan to seek more military cooperation with Turkey

The Azerbaijani-Turkish High-Level Military Dialogue group will hold a meeting in Baku on Dec. 18-20, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry announced in a statement on Saturday. The meeting will focus on military cooperation between the two countries, said the statement. Initiated in 2007 with Political-Military Assistant Working Group, Assistant Working Group on Cooperation in Defense Industry and Assistant Working Group on Material-Technical Provision functioning within the mechanism, the Azerbaijani-Turkish High- Level Military Dialogue is held once a year. The Azerbaijani delegation is headed by Deputy Defense Minister while the Turkish side led by the country's Second Chief of the General Staff. Turkey was the first country to recognize Azerbaijan's independence declared on October 18, 1991. The two countries forged diplomatic relations on Jan. 14, 1992. Military cooperation between Azerbaijan and Turkey started in 1992 with a bilateral agreement signed on military education. Since then, the two governments have been closely cooperating on defense and security.