Azerbaijan to increase its investments in Africa, President Aliyev says

During a meeting with participants of the 3rd Global Media Forum in Shusha, President Ilham Aliyev said the country seeks to expand its trade ties to Africa since it has already achieved a self-sufficient economy.

President Aliyev promised to work with African leaders on actualising investment projects, expressing confidence that the trade ties with Africa will remain stable.

“Our investment portfolio outside Azerbaijan is more than 20 billion, and with the potential that African countries have, we can create this great synergy,” he said.

“During my personal interactions with African leaders, recently during the COP29, I asked them to give a list of priorities where we can create projects to see Azerbaijani companies — private or state-owned — come in as investors, and we are actively working on that.”

President Aliyev further noted that Azerbaijan is on the positive path of gaining international prestige and relevance owing to its economic growth from oil and natural gas mining.

“We just started, we need to follow the trends of the world. We have contacts with leading international companies, and we are making investments. We want to be among the front runners,” he added.

Speaking to Citizen Digital, the assistant to the President and head of the Department of Foreign Policy Affairs, Hikmat Hajiyev, said that Azerbaijan will seek to bolster its bilateral ties with Kenya.

This, he said, will be easily facilitated through the newly launched Embassy of Azerbaijan in Kenya on June 3, 2025.

The media forum brought together 140 media professionals and government representatives from 52 countries.

This entailed professionals from 30 news agencies, 80 media entities and 7 international organisations. 

The 2025 theme was Digital Pathways: Strengthening Information and Media Resilience in the Age of AI.