RIA Novosti news agency launches debut issue in Azerbaijan

The project to publish a two-page supplement, News from Russia, to the newspaper Azerbaijan got off the ground after the parties signed an agreement on cooperation. The document was signed on October 25 in Baku between Valery Yenin, deputy director of the RIA Novosti directorate for CIS and Baltic countries, and Bakhtiyar Sadygov, the newspaper's editor-in-chief.

Under the agreement, the A-2 supplement will be published in the Azerbaijani language twice a month and will offer materials prepared by RIA Novosti.

The project aims to inform Azerbaijani readers about public, political, economic, cultural and other events in Russia, and also various aspects of bilateral cooperation to contribute to mutual understanding and closer ties between the two countries.

In his welcome speech published in the supplement, Azerbaijani Ambassador to Russia Polad Bulbul ogly said: "No doubt, the launch of the supplement News from Russia demonstrates general trends in bilateral relations, which have been called 'strategic partnership' lately."

Vasily Istratov, Russia's ambassador to Azerbaijan, said in his welcome message also published in the supplement: "The new joint project of RIA Novosti and the national newspaper Azerbaijan is called upon to play a special role because this is the first project of the Russian news agency in the post-Soviet space whose instrument will be the national language of the republic." RIA Novosti