Azernews.Az

By Vugar Khalilov

The Azerbaijani, Turkish and Georgian defence ministers have signed a joint protocol after their discussions on trilateral military cooperation held in Georgia's Kakheti region, the Azerbaijani defence Ministry reported on October 5.

“During the meeting, the defence ministers discussed the current military-political situation, the development of military cooperation in the trilateral format, as well as the issue of ensuring the security of regional projects in the region,” the ministry said.

The sides stressed the importance of the strategic partnership platform in ensuring regional peace and stability, sustainable development, as well as the well-being of the peoples of the three countries.

The military officials also discussed other issues of mutual interest in the field of military cooperation among Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Georgia.

The ministers held a joint press conference following the trilateral meeting and made a joint press statement.

Hasanov reminded the good-neighborly and friendly relations between the three countries and described the meeting in Georgia as a vivid example of a strategic dialogue between them.

The joint military exercises will help to bring trilateral activities to a new level and will contribute to regional security, Hasanov said.

In turn, Burchuladze reiterated Georgia's interest in the development of relations with Azerbaijan and Turkey.

Akar expressed confidence about the future development of the existing friendly relations among the three countries.

It was noted that the cooperation among the three countries in the defense sphere ensures peace and stability in the region.

Furthermore, Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Georgia are holding Eternity-2021 military exercises on October 5-8, 2021.

The drills aim to strengthen mutual cooperation and ensure interoperability between the armed forces of the three countries. They are considered to be significant in terms of enhancing the knowledge of participants in ensuring the security of joint strategic projects of international importance passing through the territories of the three countries, developing their operational, training, and analytical skills, as well as improving the interoperability between units providing protection for these projects.

The Eternity format of military exercises between the three countries has existed since 2017 when Georgia was the first host, followed up by the excise in 2018 hosted by Turkey. The three countries signed a partnership agreement in 2018 to further enhance military cooperation between them.

Commenting on the military component of cooperation between Turkey, Georgia, and Azerbaijan, some experts earlier said that the armed forces of these three countries had conducted exercises on the protection of trunk pipelines several times. Stressing that such experience had existed earlier, they said that other formats of such cooperation are also not ruled out in light of the results of the second Karabakh war.

--

Follow us on Twitter @AzerNewsAz