Azerbaijan to establish specially protected natural areas in liberated territories

Azerbaijan plans to establish specially protected natural areas in its liberated territories and strengthen environmental protection.

This was announced by Firuddin Aliyev, Head of the Biodiversity Protection Service at the Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources, at a press conference, News.Az reports.

“There is a wide network of Specially Protected Natural Areas (PAs) for the protection of leopards in Azerbaijan. In recent years, the area of the Specially Protected Nature Areas, habitat for leopards, has been greatly expanded,” he said.

“If in the last century, there was only Ordubad reserve (40,000 hectares) in Nakhchivan, now there are 4 Specially Protected Natural Areas with a total area of 148,645 hectares. The area of the Hirkan reserve, which was created on the basis of the previously existing 2906-hectare Hirkan National Park, has been increased to 40 thousand 358 hectares,” Aliyev added.

News.Az