Belarus’s Minister for Communication and Information Technology, Nikolai Pantelei, has told reporters that his government is working with counterparts in Azerbaijan to establish a direct communication channel between the two nations. Speaking at a bilateral ICT forum, Pantelei said that national PTO Beltelecom and AzTelekom in Azerbaijan have signed a memorandum of cooperation to work on the necessary regulation of communications as part of the plan to establish traffic exchange links between Belarus and Azerbaijan. The tie-up will enable both telcos to cut transmission costs in intra-country data traffic, he said. Echoing his thoughts, the Azerbaijani communications minister Ali Abbasov is quoted by BelTA as saying: ‘Azerbaijan is located on the outskirts of Asia, Belarus is in the heart of Europe. Therefore, such cooperation has big prospects.’