Events such as European Games to bring both economic, political dividends - AFP

Vienna, Austria, May 5 By Ilaha Mammadli – Trend: Hosting of major sports events such as the first European Games in Baku has a positive effect on the country’s image, editor-in-chief of the German service at AFP Daniel Jahn told Trend as part of the European Newspaper Congress in Vienna. "Such events bring big dividends from both economic and political points of view,” he said. “As a member of the European family, Germany will also take an active part in the European Games to be held in the capital of Azerbaijan for the first time." He said that the AFP agency, in particular, its AFP Sport branch, will broadly cover this major sporting event. "The necessary infrastructure will be created in the country,” he said. “This will be one of the main advantages of Azerbaijan. This will turn it into a center of hosting other large-scale sporting events in the future." Baku 2015 is the first-ever European Games, an exciting and innovative multi-sport event for the continent that will take place on June 12-28, 2015. There will be a total of 20 sports at Baku 2015: 16 Olympic sports and four non-Olympic sports. More than 6,000 athletes from across Europe will be representing their nations over 17 days of competition. Baku was awarded the games by the European Olympic Committees (EOC) in December 2012. follow the author on Twitter: @IlahaMammadli Follow us on Twitter @TRENDNewsAgency