Transcaucasia

Azerbaijan's president on Feb. 15 said the Upper Karabakh issue cannot be resolved in a day and there is a need to resolve the conflict in phases.

Prime Minister Ludovic Orban had a meeting with his Georgian counterpart, Giorgi Gakharia, on Friday, on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference, in which context the Romanian official thanked his counterpart for the active involvement of his country in the Black Sea-Caspian transport route.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has denied rumors that Moscow plans to recognize Turkish-occupied Cyprus which, according to some Turkish media reports, would take place in exchange for Turkey recognizing Abkhazia.

Labor and Social Policy Minister Bisser Petkov and Georgia's Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Tamara Liluashvili discussed the preparation of administrative procedures for the implementation of the Agreement on the Regulation of Labor Migration between Bulgaria and Georgia, which was signed in Tbilisi on September 30.

Azerbaijan's Foreign Ministry spokesperson on Sept. 11 voiced his country's foreign policy priorities at Azerbaijan's Embassy in Turkey.  

Turkey on Aug. 27 commemorated a slain military attache to Canada who was assassinated by an Armenian terror group in 1982.

The visit of the Bulgarian MPs Valeri Simeonov and Yordan Apostolov to the occupied territory of Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh and their meeting there with representatives of the illegal separatist regime is a direct violation of international law, Azerbaijani MP from the ruling New Azerbaijan Party Elman Nasirov told Trend.

A team of experts from Turkey has been invited to Azerbaijan for to join search for a fighter jet that crashed near the capital Baku last week, the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry said on July 30 in a statement.     

Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran, and Russia on July 17 discussed ways to enhance cooperation in technology sector between the countries.         

President Vladimir Putin signed a decree prohibiting airlines from July 8 from transporting Russians to Georgia and recommended that tour operators not sell packages for excursions to the Caucasus state. The head of state also ordered the government to secure the return of the Russians temporarily residing in Georgia.