Azerbaijan ambassador stresses need for expanded news partnership with Yonhap

By Choi Kyong-ae SEOUL, Oct. 25 (Yonhap) -- Azerbaijan's envoy to South Korea on Tuesday visited Yonhap News Agency to discuss ways to further promote cooperation between the two countries' key newswire services. In the meeting with Yonhap President Park No-hwang, Ambassador Ramzi Kazim Teymurov called for a stronger news partnership that can cultivate a better understanding between the two cultures and its people. "We enjoyed very productive relations with the Republic of Korea particularly in culture and other major fields. But I know that the media should be in front of everything since the coverage of news (in the two countries) helps provide accurate information about bilateral relations, creating new kinds of opportunities in terms of relations," Teymurov said. In November last year, Yonhap and Azerbaijan's state-run AZERTAC News renewed their existing exchange contract to include articles promoting the image of their respective countries. Previously, they had an agreement, signed in 2008, to share English news articles, photos and videos, but the new arrangement would broaden the scope of stories and images exchanged to cover such areas as culture and arts.Park said Yonhap is eager to deliver its news in English and five other languages directly to the members of the Organization of Asia-Pacific News Agencies (OANA). "Yonhap is the host news agency of the (2018) Winter Olympic Games in PyeongChang. We will take this opportunity to enhance cooperation between Yonhap and OANA news agencies," the CEO said. "We will build a content managing system between Yonhap and OANA news agencies. We will talk about this kind of program in the upcoming OANA meeting next month in Azerbaijan's capital." Yonhap has announced its candidacy for the presidency of the General Assembly of OANA for the 2019 through 2022 period. Next month, Azerbaijan's AZERTAC News will become the host agency of OANA following Russia's TASS News Agency. AZERTAC will hold the 5th News Agencies World Congress (NAWC) and the 16th OANA meetings from Nov. 16-18 in Baku. The ambassador said Park's participation in NAWC and OANA meetings next month will "definitely promote" news cooperation between the two countries. He also invited Park to the Turkic Culture Festival due to open at the national museum in Yongsan, central Seoul, on Nov. 8. The event was organized by Seoul's foreign ministry and the embassies of 5 countries -- Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan. Yonhap and the world's major newswire services are expected to gather in Azerbaijan to seek stepped-up news exchange programs in the rapidly changing media industry. NAWC is held every three years since 2004 when Russia created the global newswire association to celebrate the 100th year of its news agency TASS. OANA, which was founded in 1961, brings together 44 news agencies from 35 countries. kyongae.choi@yna.co.kr (END)