Factbox: Russian-Azerbaijani cooperation

MOSCOW, August 9 (Itar-Tass) - Azerbaijan's President Ilkham Aliyev
and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev hold a meeting in Sochi on August 9.
The two countries established diplomatic relations on April 4, 1992.
Top-level meetings have been regular since.
On June 6, 2008, the first meeting between the Russian and Azerbaijani
leaders, Dmitry Medvedev and Ilkham Aliyev, took place in St.Petersburg,
within the framework of the informal summit of the Commonwealth of
Independent States. Medvedev and Aliyev met twice in 2011.
The groundwork for bilateral cooperation comprises more than 80
inter-state, inter-governmental and inter-departmental treaties and
agreements. The basic document is the treaty of friendship, cooperation
and mutual security signed on July 3, 1997.
Economics is an important guideline for interaction. Azerbaijan, a
large producer of hydrocarbons in the CIS, is Russia's natural partner.
Russia is an active participant in Azerbaijan's oil and gas projects.
In September 2002, the two countries signed a Caspian seabed
delimitation accord. Russia's LUKOIL has a 30- and 10-percent stake in the
projects to develop the Karabakh and Shah Deniz fields, respectively.
Transneft is the operator of the Russian segment of the Baku-Novorossiysk
pipeline with throughput capacity at 250,000 tons a month. Azerbaijan's
oil is also shipped to world markets through the Baku-Supsa and
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipelines.
Until January 2007, Azerbaijan purchased gas from Russia in the amount
of 4.5 billion cubic meters a year. Due to increasing gas prices, Baku
scrapped the gas import plans. In 2007, Azerbaijan began industrial
production of gas at the Shah Deniz field with estimated reserves at 1.3
trillion cubic meters, which enabled the country to meet the domestic
demand and began to export gas to Georgia, Turkey and Greece. Experts
believe Azerbaijan will be able to produce 27 to 30 billion cubic meters
of gas a year in the near future.
In early June 2008, Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller offered Azerbaijan's
President Ilkham Aliyev to sell gas under a long-term accord. In March
2009, Gazprom and the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (GNKAR) signed a
memorandum on the beginning of the negotiations over the terms of
sale/purchase of Azerbaijani natural gas. Gas supplies to Russia began
from January 1, 2010. Initially, it was planned that the volume of
supplies would reach 500 million cubic meters, but GNKAR later decided to
boost the exports to one billion cubic meters in 2010. Beginning from
2011, Gazprom began to purchase up to 2 billion cubic meters of gas a year
from Azerbaijan. In 2012, gas exports from Azerbaijan to Russia are
expected to exceed 2 billion cubic meters a year.
Azerbaijan has 395 companies and organizations with Russian stakes,
including 176 joint ventures, and 95 firms with 100-percent Russian
stakes. There are 124 offices and branches of Russian companies in the
republic, the largest of them being AvtoVAZ, Rosselmash, Metrovagonmash,
and the Krasnoye Sormovo shipyard.
In 2010, bilateral trade reached 1.948 billion dollars, up 9.4 percent
from the previous year. Russia is Azerbaijan's third largest trade
partner. The share of Azerbaijan in export-import operations totals 6.9
percent. There are 1,541 items of trade in bilateral export/import
operations. Russia supplies to Azerbaijan foodstuffs, agricultural raw
materials, machinery, equipment, means of transportation, timber, paper
and pulp. Textile, cotton and foodstuffs prevail in Azerbaijan's exports
to Russia.
In February 2003, the parties signed an intergovernmental military
cooperation agreement in Baku. The defense ministries of the two countries
have regular contacts. The Gabala radar station is integrated in the
Russian ABM defense system. Under the agreement signed in January 2002,
the radar was given the status of information and analytical center which
Russia will lease for a decade.
Border cooperation is an important element of bilateral ties, given
the general situation in the Caucasus and the tasks to combat
international terrorism. The Russian-Azerbaijani border is 338-kilometers
long.
In September 2010, Russia and Azerbaijan signed an agreement on the
state border. The parties also concluded an inter-governmental agreement
of rational use and protection of the border river Samur, and its use
under the 50/50 principle. The Samur is 230 kilometers long, including the
38-kilometer border stretch before it flows into the Caspian Sea.
The Nagorno Karabakh problem is in the focus of attention at bilateral
talks. As a result of Russia's mediation, the region has been under
ceasefire since May 1994.
As a co-chair of the Minsk Group, Russia continues to participate in
the conflict settlement talks.
On November 2, 2008, a tripartite meeting between the presidents of
Russia, Azerbaijan and Armenia took place, at which the parties signed a
declaration confirming their commitments to a political settlement of the
conflict.
On June 24, 2011, the Russian leader brokered a meeting between the
Armenian leader Serzh Sargsyan and Azerbaijani leader Ilkham Aliyev, their
ninth tripartite talks in Kazan.
Russian regions develop direct ties with Azerbaijan. Among the active
partners are Dagestan, Tatarstan, Moscow and St. Petersburg, the
Astrakhan, Moscow, Saratov, Sverdlovsk and Chelyabinsk regions.
Up to 390 Azerbaijani students study in Russian colleges.