At the end of September "unexpectedly" the US CIA Director General Michael Hayden visited Baku. Usually such visits are either widely advertised or kept top secret. This is what happened this time; nothing was ever mentioned about the General Hayden's one-day-visit beforehand, and after the visit not many details of it were made public. The visit took place on September 28 and included a meeting with President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev and the Minister of National Security Eldar Mahmudov.