In an interview with Trend news agency, Popova said Brussels should "cooperate in this sphere with Azerbaijan not through instruction but on an equal footing." She congratulated President Ilham Aliyev on his efforts to turn their country into "an independent, stable and economically successful [one]."

"No Western or Eastern country can call another country corrupt or non-corrupt. Corruption surmounts borders, it is a trans-national, international affair. It is a vice of the present-day global world," Popova said.