On September 12, Rovshan Rzayev, the Chairman of the State Committee for Refugees and IDPs, met with the newly appointed representative of the World Health Organization (WHO) to Azerbaijan Ms. Fatos Hande Harmanci. The Chairman of the State Committee congratulated Ms. Fatos Hande Harmanci on her new appointment. Speaking about the close cooperation between the Republic of Azerbaijan and WHO, the Chairman of the State Committee underlined that this cooperation has a positive impact on the development of healthcare in our country, as well as improvement of the quality of medical services provided to refugees and internally displaced persons. The guest was informed that as a result of Armenia`s military aggression and policy of occupation against Azerbaijan, more than twenty thousand Azerbaijani died, tens of thousands people were injured, became disabled and one million two hundred thousand people were displaced from their homelands and had to live in temporary shelters, places not meeting sanitary and hygiene standards, dangerous for life as refugees and internally displaced persons. Nevertheless, the government of Azerbaijan had used all resources to meet the initial needs of its IDPs, as well as refugees came to our country from Armenia and other conflict zones. Today, the President Ilham Aliyev attaches great importance to the solution of social problems of refugees and internally displaced persons, including provision with necessary medical care. Significant steps have been taken to improve their living conditions. The number of settlements built for internally displaced persons has been reaching 100. Medical centers operate in all these settlements. The projects launched at the initiative of the First Vice President Mrs. Mehriban Aliyeva related to relocating IDPs living in the most difficult conditions to new apartments are being successfully implemented. For this purpose, over 800 IDP families have been provided with new apartments in the last three months from the special-purpose housing fund in “Gobu Park” residential complex built in Garadagh district of Baku. Stating that the support of WHO could be important in the development and implementation of projects related to the recovery of the health of IDPs living in difficult conditions for many years and improvement of health services provided to them, the Chairman of the Committee expressed his confidence that Ms. Harmanci will contribute to the expansion of cooperation in this field. Mrs. Fatos Hande Harmanci thanked for the warm welcome. Noting that the attention and care shown to IDPs in Azerbaijan is praiseworthy, she said that she will endeavor to further strengthen the WTO`s relations with our country. Other issues of mutual interest were also discussed at the meeting.