Azerbaijan’s economy increased 25 percent in 2007

Azerbaijan’s rapid economic growth continued in 2007, reaching 25 percent at year end. However this was lower than both the IMF’s predicted 29 percent and the 2006 figure of 35 percent. Budget expenditure in 2007 indicated a tenfold increase since 2003. President Ilham Aliyev recently said over 600 000 jobs have been created in Azerbaijan over the past four years, 460 000 of them permanent, according to the news agency Regnum.