Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev will inaugurate the seventh Ministerial Conference of Heart of Asia in Baku on Thursday.

AVA- While leaving Kabul for the gathering, Ghani called it a key regional platform to strengthen political ties and boost regional cooperation for the stability and connectivity in the Heart of Asia region.
 
Ahead of the conference, whose theme is security and economic connectivity, a senior officials meeting was held to finalize the draft of the declaration at the end of the conference.
 
Adela Raz, Afghanistan’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Economic Cooperation, who co-chaired the meeting with deputy foreign minister of the hosting country, said that Heart of Asia – Istanbul Process is an effective platform for expanding regional cooperation and convergence with focus on Afghanistan and strengthening regional consensus on the country.
 
The Heart of Asia-Istanbul Process was launched in 2011 with members including Afghanistan, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, China, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan and UAE.
 
17 more nations including EU countries and U.S. are supporting the initiative.