Baku, Astana open up new opportunities for Eurasia President Aliyev’s visit to Kazakhstan in focus on Euronews

The European media outlet Euronews has published an article covering the recent state visit of Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev to Kazakhstan, where the two countries signed 15 agreements advancing regional infrastructure, energy, and trade cooperation. Caliber.Az presents the adapted version of the piece.

The article reads that the leaders of both countries laid out the paths ahead on major infrastructure and energy projects for the Eurasian region within the enhanced strategic partnerships between the two economic powerhouses of the region.

Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev and his Kazakhstan counterpart Kassym-Jomart Tokayev signed 15 agreements covering energy, transport, industry and artificial intelligence, during Aliyev's state visit to Kazakhstan.

The visit marks the 20th anniversary of the Treaty on Strategic Partnership and Allied Relations between the two countries, and it signals a major economic offensive for the two countries together with their neighbours within the Organisation of Turkic states.

The Middle Corridor, which connects Europe and Asia, including China, through Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, is a strategic connectivity project for the region and globally, as traffic is shifting from traditional routes, which include Russia.

Kazakhstan's president announced that the Middle Corridor, also known as the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route, keeps growing in freight traffic, with a major cargo hub being built along the way, including a Trans-Caspian ferry system for new supply chains. He noted that freight traffic along this key Eurasian link grew by 62% last year to 4.5 million tons, and countries plan to increase that figure to 10 million tons. Tokayev highlighted efforts to remove “bottlenecks” and harmonise tariffs along the corridor.

President Aliyev, for his part, emphasised the strategic importance of the Zangezur Corridor, a new transport route connecting Azerbaijan with Nakhchivan and onward to Türkiye. He said its completion would further boost regional logistics capacity by 2028.

Both sides also pledged to double bilateral trade to $1 billion (€861 million) in the near future, with a growing volume of joint ventures in agriculture, IT and other domains.

The presidents also signed energy agreements and a framework for a joint investment mechanism between Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna and the State Oil Company of the Republic of Azerbaijan (SOCAR).

Kazakhstan plans to expand oil shipments through Azerbaijan’s Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline, which carried 1.5 million tons of Kazakh crude last year.

The material also spotlights the historic peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan sets the stage for an economic revival of the region, and Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan are now charting a new phase of cooperation.

"Kazakhstan officially welcomed this important event. I am confident that the agreements reached will strengthen the atmosphere of trust in the South Caucasus and open up new opportunities for universal progress," Tokayev said.

During his state visit, Aliyev made the surprise announcement that Azerbaijan lifted all restrictions on cargo transit to Armenia, and the first such transit was the shipment of Kazakh grain.

"I do believe that this is also a good indicator that peace between Azerbaijan and Armenia is no longer just on paper but is already a matter of practice," Aliyev said.