Consul General Azarbaijan Spoke at PI Westwood
Azarbaijan Consul General Elin Suleymanov spoke at the PI Westwood Luncheon Forum about Azarbaijan and Regional Challenges.
On November 14, 2005, the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev appointed Elin Suleymanov as Azerbaijan’s first Consul General to Los Angeles, California with personal rank of Envoy Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary. Prior to that he served as Senior Counselor at the Foreign Relations Department, Office of the President in Baku, Azerbaijan and as Press Officer of the Azerbaijani Embassy in Washington, DC. Before joining diplomatic service, Mr. Suleymanov worked with United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Azerbaijan and with the Open Media Research Institute in Prague, Czech Republic.
A graduate of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in Medford, Massachusetts, Mr. Suleymanov also holds graduate degrees from the Political Geography department of the Moscow State University, Russia, and from the University of Toledo, Ohio. Mr. Suleymanov speaks Azerbaijani, English, Russian and Czech languages.
Consul General elaborated on some of the challenges ahead of Azarbaijan and gave the audience a brief information of the history of the Republic which is the first Muslim nation to adopt democracy in 1918 and the first to adopt women’s rights to their citizens. He also stated the meaning of the colors of the flag.
Being in a volatile region, he emphasized greatly on the joint efforts of Turks, European Union and the United States which plays a critical role for the balance of power in recent conflicts.
He went on to say that Turkey is behaving in a positive manner to normalize the relations in the region with all sides.
Consul General also told that more important than the oil is the transfer of gas in the region. The oil pipeline between Baku- Ceyhan is very important but more emphasis should be placed on a possible gas pipeline.