Azertac State news agency,
1, August 2007

President Ilham Aliyev held Wednesday a meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers to discuss the results OF THE FIRST HALF of 2007.

Opening the meeting, the President said the Gross Domestic Product growth has reached 35% in the 1st half of this year, adding it has doubled in the last three years. Ilham Aliyev said the country's industry has grown 35 percent in the first six months, while agriculture 5 percent.

He added that the incomes of the population have risen 37 percent during this period, whilst salaries have increased 26 percent.

The Head of State said 572,000 jobs, including 405,000 permanent ones, have been created in Azerbaijan since October 2003. Ilham Aliyev said the poverty level will decrease substantially this year.

The President also stressed the importance of increasing efforts towards fighting inflation. He said it is very important to pay attention to the assurance of transparency in budget expenditures. The Azerbaijani leader said population's salaries as well as pensions for poor groups of society and families of shahids will increase in a regular manner.

He said that the country's currency reserves currently exceed $5.1 billion. The President described the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil and the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipelines projects as well as the Kars-Akhalkalaki-Tbilisi-Baku railway project as Azerbaijan's huge success.

President Aliyev said prevention of Albania's selling weapons to Armenia is another evidence of Azerbaijan's growing international prestige. Pointing to Armenia's destructive position in the negotiations on the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Ilham Aliyev said it should be solved only in accordance with the principle of territorial integrity and sovereignty of Azerbaijan. He also stressed that much more attention will be paid to the strengthening of army.

Ilham Aliyev noted the 2008 budget will surpass last year's in terms of quality and quantity. Other speakers including Samir Sharifov, Minister of Finance, Misir Mardanov, Minister of Education, Ismat Abbasov, Minister of Agriculture, Ali Abbasov, Minister of Communications and Information Technologies, and Karam Hasanov, Chairman of the State Committee for State Property Management, delivered reports on the work done by their departments in the 1st half of 2007.

President Ilham Aliyev summed up the meeting.