Russia welcomes election results in Azerbaijan

Russia welcomes the successful holding of the snap presidential elections in Azerbaijan.

“The Russian side welcomes the successful holding of elections in Azerbaijan and is committed to further strengthening the alliance and strategic partnership with the Republic of Azerbaijan, active joint work on international and regional issues, including the implementation of the trilateral agreements at the highest level on the normalisation of the Armenia-Azerbaijan relations,” Report informs citing the Russian Foreign Ministry’s statement.

The Russian Foreign Ministry reminded that Russian President Vladimir Putin warmly congratulated Ilham Aliyev during a phone talk and sent a congratulatory telegram.

“The voting results fully confirmed people’s support for the Azerbaijani president’s policy on the country’s accelerated socio-economic development and strengthening its positions on the world stage,” the congratulatory telegram says.

Some 790 international observers monitored the elections in Azerbaijan. The Russian Federation sent 148 representatives through the Federal Assembly, the Executive Committee and the Interparliamentary Assembly of the CIS, the SCO and OSCE/ODIHR.

 “CIS Secretary General Sergei Lebedev emphasised that the elections complied with the principles of democratic expression of will, and there was a high voter turnout. Chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Foreign Affairs Grigory Karasin noted that the voting was held on a competitive, alternative basis and in a favourable atmosphere. SCO Secretary-General Zhang Ming pointed to the openness and transparency of the elections,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

“The conclusions made by the Western countries and international organisations controlled by them were extremely biased. As we saw, they were initially extremely biased toward the presidential elections in Azerbaijan and were preparing pre-approved methods to discredit the electoral process,” the Russian Foreign Ministry added.

The snap presidential elections were held in Azerbaijan on February 7. According to preliminary data from the Azerbaijani Central Election Commission (CEC), received from all polling stations, Ilham Aliyev is leading in the elections, gaining 92.12 per cent of the votes.