On the 135th anniversary of Azerbaijan's national press, Turkish official news source - Anadolu Agency published an interview of Director General of Azerbaijan State Telegraph Agency (AzerTAc) Aslan Aslanov.
In his interview, the AzerTAc chief said Azerbaijani press was the product of independence. Aslanov noted "in Azerbaijan, where a handful of newspapers and magazines were published in the Soviet period.
"Now there are over 30 daily and 100 weekly newspapers representing interests of all social classes, 8 republican and 14 regional TV channels."
He stated that the number of Internet users in the country exceeds 40 percent "which testifies an openness of the modern Azerbaijan society".
The interview underlines that on the occasion of the anniversary, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev signed a whole package of orders aimed at improving the material resources of the mass media and strengthening social security of journalists, including allocation of AZN5 million ($6,250m) from the Presidential reserve fund for building an apartment house for media-related persons.
Aslanov said this was "a vivid evidence of how much significance the Azerbaijani government attaches to strengthening the free and independent media in the country".

AzerTAc