MOGADISHU, Somalia 

Azerbaijan’s president on Saturday received the credentials of Somalia’s new ambassador to Turkey, Jama Abdullahi Mohamed, as a non-resident ambassador to Azerbaijan.

“President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev has received credentials of newly-appointed non-resident ambassadors of the Republic of Guatemala, Ireland, the Republic of Albania, the Kingdom of Norway, the Republic of Montenegro, the Republic of Estonia, the Federal Republic of Somalia, New Zealand, the Republic of Slovenia and the Kingdom of Denmark,” Azerbaijani state news agency AZERTAC reported on Saturday.

“I presented my credentials to HE Ilham Aliyev @presidentaz as an Ankara based ambassador to Azerbaijan,” the Somali diplomat said on Twitter.

He added that Somalia and Azerbaijan have a historical and brotherly relationship on multilateral platforms such as the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and the United Nations.

“Today marks the beginning of the formal bilateral relationship,” Mohamed said.

Mohamed also met with Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov who noted with satisfaction the existing friendly and cooperative relations between the two countries, an official statement by Azerbaijan said.

Bayramov also briefed Mohamed on the latest developments in the region, the situation in the Nagorno-Karabakh territories liberated from Armenia last fall, the threat of landmines, as well as the process of reconstruction and rehabilitation in these areas, according to the statement.