Tag: Recep Tayyip Erdogan

12th president of Turkey

  • TURKEY-ARMENIA NORMALIZATION LINKED TO ARMENIA-AZERBAIJAN CONFLICT RESOLUTION

    TURKEY-ARMENIA NORMALIZATION LINKED TO ARMENIA-AZERBAIJAN CONFLICT RESOLUTION

    Wednesday, December 9, 2009—Volume 6, Issue 226  THE JAMESTOWN FOUNDATION


    by Vladimir Socor

    Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has clearly reaffirmed the linkage between normalization of Turkey-Armenia relations and early substantial progress toward resolution of the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict. Ankara defines such progress as an agreement on withdrawal of Armenian troops from occupied districts of Azerbaijan beyond Upper Karabakh, pending a determination of the latter’s future status.

    Erdogan reinforced this linkage during his December 7-8 visit to Washington, despite U.S. and E.U. attempts in recent months to break that linkage and to convince Ankara also to break it. That course of action ignored and alienated Azerbaijan, playing into Russia’s hands and jeopardizing Western strategic interests in the South Caucasus. Washington and Brussels seemed to be guided primarily by internal political considerations in adopting that policy. They will now have to reconsider it, in the wake of Erdogan’s and Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu’s latest clarifying statements.

    The U.S. agenda for Erdogan’s visit, as publicized ahead of the event (White House website, December 4) included neither the Karabakh conflict nor energy projects such as Nabucco among the issues to be discussed by President Barack Obama with Erdogan.

    The first omission reflected Washington’s attempts to de-link the Karabakh conflict-resolution negotiations from Turkey-Armenia normalization. U.S. policy (seconded by that of the E.U. and Russia) pressed for Turkish parliamentary ratification of the October 10 Turkey-Armenia protocols on establishing full diplomatic relations and opening the land border between them, without conditioning this on Armenian troop withdrawal from certain Azerbaijani districts.

    The omission of energy transit issues from the U.S.-prepared agenda remained without official explanation, but could be seen as relegating Caspian and European energy security to a secondary level on the White House’s list of priorities. This perception would ipso facto reduce Azerbaijan’s importance to U.S. policy in this administration, compared with preceding U.S. administrations of both parties. Obama solicited Turkish support on Afghanistan, Iran, and Iraq as top U.S. priorities, while also urging Turkish ratification of the protocols with Armenia.

    Obama did not mention the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict or a Karabakh resolution process at the concluding news conference. It was Erdogan who reintroduced this issue into the equation: “We have also discussed [issues] between Azerbaijan and Armenia, which are of great importance in the context of Turkey-Armenia relations…because the normalization process between Turkey and Armenia is very much related to those issues,” Erdogan stated at the joint news conference (White House press release, December 7; APA, PBS, December 8).

    In follow-up statements in Washington, Erdogan recounted that he had “explained to him [Obama]” that Turkey-Armenia normalization is difficult without resolving the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict. The Turkish parliament is “conditioning” the protocols’ ratification on conflict-resolution, it “feels strongly about this,” and it “cannot be dictated to,” he declared. He called for Armenian troop withdrawal from seven Azerbaijani districts and urged the “Minsk Group’s” co-chairs (U.S., Russia, France) to promote that goal (APA, December 8).

    U.S. policy makers were still pressing as recently as last month for de-synchronizing the two processes. On the eve of Erdogan’s visit, however, the Turkish position had become clear. During the OSCE’s year-end conference in Athens, Davutoglu stated that the Turkish parliament can only ratify the Turkey-Armenia protocols after the Karabakh issue is resolved (Trend, December 2).

    Erdogan clarifiedin an interview televised in Azerbaijan–that “resolution” means, in this context, “reaching an agreement [between Azerbaijan and Armenia] regarding the seven districts….We have told U.S. officials all along: If you want to resolve the Turkey-Armenia issue, you should also resolve the Karabakh conflict. Otherwise any resolution would be impossible…The Turkish-Armenian issue and the Karabakh problems are closely related” (ANS TV cited by Day.az, December 4, 5).

    The Turkish parliament’s foreign policy commission chairman, Suat Kiniklioglu, corroborated this view in a public debate in Brussels. While Turkey-Armenia normalization has the potential to dramatically improve the overall situation in the South Caucasus, “it would be incomprehensible and illogical to normalize relations on one side while maintaining a conflict on the other side” (Day.az, December 4).

    Ankara was slow to clarify its position in recent months. For its part, Washington put domestic politics ahead of strategic considerations. To deflect pressures from Armenian advocacy groups and a large part of the U.S. Congress, the Obama administration decided to push for re-opening the Turkish-Armenian border before April 2010, when the Armenian genocide resolution comes up for reconsideration in Congress. Candidate Obama had promised to sign such a resolution, but President Obama cannot do so. Instead, the White House decided in April 2009 (at the time of Obama’s visit to Turkey) to press for re-opening the Turkish-Armenian land border, hoping to defuse the explosive potential from the annual political debate on the genocide issue.

    This course of action, however, could only be pursued at Azerbaijan’s expense and at the risk of fracturing the Turkey-Azerbaijan partnership, instead of nurturing it. That partnership largely accounts for the West’s strategic gains in the South Caucasus-Caspian region over the past decade. Strained recently by Russian advances in the region and a burgeoning Russo-Turkish partnership, the West’s gains could be severely jeopardized by policies that isolate Azerbaijan or sacrifice its interests.

    Baku does recognizeas presidential adviser Novruz Mammadov has put it (www.day.az, December 6)that the U.S. initiative to help normalize Turkey-Armenia relations can generate positive dynamics for regional cooperation, if this initiative is synchronized with Karabakh conflict-resolution. But it would only exacerbate tensions in the region, if the two processes are separated, instead of converging.

    –Vladimir Socor

  • Lies, Damn Lies, and Armenian Deaths

    Lies, Damn Lies, and Armenian Deaths

    Bruce Fein

    Posted: June 4, 2009 06:10 PM

    On April 24, 2009–Armenian Remembrance Day– President Barack Obama issued a statement “remember[ing] the 1.5 million Armenian [deaths] in the final days of the Ottoman Empire.” The President stumbled.

    To paraphrase Mark Twain, there are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and the number of Armenians who are claimed by Armenians and their echo chambers to have died in an alleged World War I genocide. Almost a century later, the number of deaths they assert oscillates between 1.5-2 million. But the best contemporary estimates by Armenians or their sympathizers were 300,000-750,000 (compared with 2.4 million Ottoman Muslim deaths in Anatolia). Further, not a single one of those deaths necessarily falls within the definition of genocide in the authoritative Genocide Convention of 1948. It requires proof that the accused was responsible for the physical destruction of a group in whole or in substantial part specifically because of their race, nationality, religion, or ethnicity. A political or military motivation for a death falls outside the definition.

    Immediately after the war, when events and memories were fresh, Armenians had no incentive to concoct high casualty figures or genocidal motivations for their deaths. Their objective was statehood. Armenians were encouraged by the self-determination concept in President Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points, (while conveniently forgetting that they were a minority in Eastern Anatolia where they hoped to found a new nation). Armenian leaders pointed to their military contribution to defeating the Ottomans and population figures that would sustain an Armenian nation.

    Boghus Nubar, then Head of the Armenian Delegation to the Paris Peace Conference (1919), wrote to the French Foreign Minister Stephen Pichon: “The Armenians have been, since the beginning of the war, de facto belligerents, as you yourself have acknowledged, since they have fought alongside the Allies on all fronts, enduring heavy sacrifices and great suffering for the sake of their unshakable attachment to the cause of the Entente….” Nubar had earlier written to the Foreign Minister on October 29, 1918, that Armenians had earned their independence: “We have fought for it. We have poured out our blood for it without stint. Our people played a gallant part in the armies that won the victory.”

    When their quest for statehood shipwrecked on the Treaty of Lausanne and annexation by the Soviet Union in 1921, Armenians revised their soundtrack to endorse a contrived genocide thesis. It seeks a “pound of flesh” from the Republic of Turkey in the form of recognition, reparations, and boundary changes. To make their case more convincing, Armenians hiked the number of deaths. They also altered their story line from having died as belligerents against the Turks to having perished like unarmed helpless lambs.

    Vahan Vardapet, an Armenian cleric, estimated a prewar Ottoman Armenian population of 1.26 million. At the Peace Conference, Armenian leader Nubar stated that 280,000 remained in the Empire and 700,000 had emigrated elsewhere. Accepting those Armenian figures, the number of dead would be 280,000. George Montgomery of the Armenia-American Society estimated a prewar Armenian population of 1.4-1.6 million, and a casualty figure of 500,000 or less. Armenian Van Cardashian, in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 1919, placed the number of Armenian dead at 750,000, i.e., a prewar population of 1.5 million and a post-war figure of 750,000.

    After statehood was lost, Armenians turned to their genocide playbook which exploited Christian bigotries and contempt for Ottoman Muslims. They remembered earlier successful anti-Ottoman propaganda. United States Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire during the war, Henry Morganthau, was openly racist and devoted to propaganda. On November 26, 1917, Morgenthau confessed in a letter to President Wilson that he intended to write a book vilifying Turks and Germans to, “win a victory for the war policy of the government.” In his biography, “Ambassador Morgenthau’s Story,” Morgenthau betrays his racist hatred toward Turks (“humanity and civilization never for a moment enters their mind”) and unconditional admiration for Armenians (“They are so superior to the Turks intellectually and morally.”).

    British Prime Minister Gladstone’s histrionic figure of 60,000 Bulgarian Christians slaughtered in 1876 captured the imagination of the west. The true figure later provided by a British Ambassador was 3,500–including Turks who were first slain by the Christians.

    From 280,000-750,000, Armenians initially raised their death count to 800,000 to test the credibility waters. It passed muster with uninformed politicians easily influenced by campaign contributions and voting clout. Armenians then jumped the number to 1.5 million, and then 1.8 million by Armenian historian Kevork Aslan. For the last decades, an Armenian majority seems to have settled on the 1.5 million death plateau–which still exceeds their contemporary estimates by 200 to 500 percent. They are now testing the waters at 2.5-3 million killed as their chances for a congressional genocide resolution recede. It speaks volumes that champions of the inflated death figures have no explanation for why Armenians on the scene would have erred. Think of the absurdity of discarding the current death count of Afghan civilians in the United States-Afghan war in favor of a number deduced in the year 2109!

    Armenians have a genuine tale of woe. It largely overlaps with the tale of tragedy and suffering that can be told by Ottoman Muslims during the war years: 2.4 million deaths in Anatolia, ethnic cleansing, starvation, malnutrition, untreated epidemics, and traumatic privations of war under a decrepit and collapsing Empire.

    Unskewed historical truth is the antechamber of Turkish-Armenian reconciliation. That is why the Government of Turkey has proposed an international commission of impartial and independent experts with access to all relevant archives to determine the number and characterization of World War I deaths. Armenians are balking because they are skeptical of their own figures and accusations.

  • Obama Should Forfeit his Nobel Prize

    Obama Should Forfeit his Nobel Prize


    Until he Tells the Truth on Genocide

    By Harut Sassounian
    Publisher, The California Courier
    sassounian3
    In his letter of November 20 to Armenian American organizations, Pres. Obama once again played shameful word games with the term genocide. At this point, one has to be incredibly naïve to believe that he is going to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide during the rest of his term in office.

    During the presidential campaign, when Sen. Obama was making repeated promises to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide, Armenian activists were nervously following the Turkish government’s attempts to use the false pretext of dialogue with Armenia to prevent him from fulfilling his pledge after the election.

    In early April, during a press conference in Ankara, when Pres. Obama was asked about his views on the Armenian Genocide, he dodged the question by stating: “My views are on the record and I have not changed views. What I have been very encouraged by is news that under President Gul’s leadership, you are seeing a series of negotiations, a process in place between Armenia and Turkey to resolve a whole host of longstanding issues, including this one.”

    Clearly, Presidents Obama and Gul, for their own reasons, were scheming to undermine the recognition of the Armenian Genocide by pushing forward the Armenia-Turkey negotiations. They were joined in this unholy alliance by Russia and the European Union in pressuring Armenia’s leaders, who were only too eager to comply.

    This sinister deal was sealed when on the eve of April 24, Armenia and Turkey issued a joint press release announcing a roadmap for reconciliation!

    Not surprisingly, in his first April 24 statement, Pres. Obama repeated all the euphemisms and word games for which he had strongly condemned his predecessor, President Bush! Obama used the old and all too familiar denialist terminology of past presidents, such as “atrocity,” “massacre,” “terrible events of 1915,” and most incredibly, “Meds Yeghern”!

    In that statement, Pres. Obama used the same evasive answer he gave in Ankara: “I have consistently stated my own view of what occurred in 1915, and my view of that history has not changed.” Yet, he adamantly persisted in refusing to state what his actual views were.

    Furthermore, Pres. Obama urged Armenians and Turks “to address the facts of the past as a part of their efforts to move forward.” He expressed his strong support for their “courageous and important dialogue…to work through this painful history…” and applauded the Armenian and Turkish governments for accepting “a framework and roadmap for normalization.”

    Consequently, Pres. Obama left no doubt that he was going to sacrifice the truth of the “Armenian Genocide” on the altar of an illusory Armenian-Turkish reconciliation, using it as a fig leaf to conceal his erstwhile pledge.

    Last month, in a letter to Armenian American organizations, Pres. Obama reconfirmed that his view on “one of the great atrocities of the 20th century” had not changed. Once again, he failed to detail his views! The President was responding to a letter from the AGBU, Armenian Assembly, and Diocese of the Armenian Church of America. The three Armenian organizations had expressed their support for the Armenia-Turkey Protocols and appealed to the White House to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide. In his response, Pres. Obama cleverly exploited the expression of support by the Armenian organizations for the reconciliation process, and downplayed his campaign pledge to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide. He reiterated that “the best way to advance…the just acknowledgment of the facts” is for Armenians and Turks to address the past “as part of their efforts to move forward.” He pledged “to continue to vigorously support the normalization effort in the months ahead.” The President was thus using the Protocols to undermine all efforts to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide.

    Keeping his pledge on the Armenian Genocide is in Pres. Obama’s own interest, as it would help rehabilitate his moral and political credibility by joining Pres. Reagan and scores of national parliaments, international organizations, and Holocaust and genocide scholars who are already on record confirming the facts of the Armenian Genocide.

    Pres. Obama should not be surprised if Armenian-Americans no longer trust him, and do not support him for re-election. Those who play games with genocide should not be rewarded.

    Anyone who lacks the courage to stand up for the truth does not deserve a Nobel Peace Prize!
  • Turkey is part of the solution, not of the problem

    Turkey is part of the solution, not of the problem

    says its EU minister EGEMEN BAGIS

    Enlargement – 03-12-2009 – 12:49
    Turkey’s progress this year on the path to EU accession was debated by its EU affairs minister and chief negotiator Egemen Bağış and Foreign Affairs Committee MEPs on 2 December. His visit coincided with the committee’s first discussion of a draft report on Turkey by Ria Oomen-Ruijten (EPP, NL).

    Given the challenges that the EU faces – such as energy security, climate change, and economic crisis – “Turkey is committed to contribute to the solutions and is not part of the problem”, Turkish Minister for EU Affairs and Chief Negotiator Egemen Bağış told the Foreign Affairs Committee.
    Mr Bağış reaffirmed Turkey’s determination to pursue the EU accession process, as demonstrated by its 4-year national reform programme, despite the fact that negotiations on several issues had been halted by Turkey’s failure to apply to Cyprus the Additional Protocol to the Ankara Agreement.
    Copenhagen criteria
    EP rapporteur on Turkey Ria Oomen-Ruijten (EPP, NL) stressed that even though Turkey had passed laws relevant to the Copenhagen political criteria, it was still doing too little to implement them, particularly in the areas of women’s rights and non-discrimination. She also asked what Turkey would do to enable the ratification of the protocol with Armenia, to which Mr Bağış replied that “Turkey wants to move forwards and have good relations with all its neighbours”.
    Asked by Alexander Graf Lambsdorff (ALDE, DE) when Turkey will achieve a breakthrough on constitutional reform, Mr Bağış replied “because 2010 will be a year without elections in Turkey, the government will try to reach a consensus with the opposition in order to enable the constitutional reform”.
    Bilateral issues
    “How can Turkey continue to move towards the EU if it does not solve its bilateral issues?” asked Marietta Giannakou (EPP, EL), in a reference to Cyprus. “Why are you maintaining the status quo on occupation of Cyprus?” asked Takis Hadjigeorgiou (GUE/NGL, CY). “Regarding Cyprus, it takes two to tango” replied Mr Bağış, adding that “the final solution must be based on equality”.
    Maria Eleni Koppa (S&D, EL) criticised Turkey’s violation of Greek air space in the Aegean sea. “We need to start exploratory talks to define air space”, replied Mr Bağış.
    Readmission agreement
    “Illegal immigration is not just a Greek and Turkish issue, but a European one” and the EU-Turkey Readmission Agreement must be concluded on the principle of “common burden sharing”, said Mr Bağış in reply to questions from several MEPs. For several decades, Turkish goods have been able to move freely within the EU, whereas Turkish citizens cannot, he added.
    Religious minority rights
    Commenting on debate over the Swiss referendum decision to ban the building of minarets and the problems still faced by religious minorities in Turkey, Mr Bağış said that “Turkey is a place of co-existence and has a history of more than 800 years in which different cultures live together.”
    Afghanistan
    Replying to a question from Geoffrey Van Orden (ECR, UK) as to whether Turkey intends to reinforce its troops in Afghanistan, Mr Bağış noted that for the third time, his country was leading the International Security Assistance Force command and “if all members of NATO decide to increase participation, Turkey will not differ on that.”
    Iran
    Elmar Brok (EPP, DE) asked about developments in Iran and Turkey’s possible involvement in exporting nuclear materials. Mr  Mr Bağış stressed the importance if dialogue with Iran, adding that “if Iran had nuclear weapons we would be more worried then you are.”
    Committee on Foreign Affairs
    In the chair: Gabriele Albertini (EPP, Italy).

    With the Lisbon Treaty, in force as of 1 December 2009, the European Parliament has important new lawmaking powers. Virtually all EU legislation is now decided by the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers together – including agriculture, immigration, energy and the EU budget. As the only directly elected EU institution, Parliament’s position in making sure the EU is accountable to its citizens is also strengthened, for example by MEPs having a bigger say in appointments to many of the EU’s top jobs.
    REF. : 20091130IPR65569

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  • Turkey-Armenia Ties Connected to Karabakh

    Turkey-Armenia Ties Connected to Karabakh

    After White House Meeting, Erdogan Says Turkey-Armenia Ties Connected to Karabakh

    By Asbarez Staff on Dec 7th, 2009


    Read the Press Conference Transcript

    WASHINGTON (Combined Sources)—Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters after his meeting with President Obama that the normalization of Armenia-Turkey relations was contingent on the resolution of the Karabakh conflict.

    According to Erdogan, the US and Turkish leaders discussed relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia.

    “This is important in the context of relations between Turkey and Armenia,” he said, adding that the two also discussed the Karabakh conflict within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group.

    On the issue of Turkish-Armenian reconciliation, Obama said Erdogan had been “courageous” in his efforts to normalize the decades-old resentment and bitterness.

    Obama and Erdogan were also reported to have discussed Iran. According to Reuters, Obama said on Monday that Turkey could be an “important player” in efforts to resolve the long-running dispute over Iran’s nuclear program.

    The US President made the statement during a White House meeting with Erdogan, who said his country stands ready to do whatever it can to achieve a diplomatic solution to the issue.

    Obama said he had stressed the importance of resolving the dispute “in a way that allows Iran to pursue peaceful nuclear energy, but provides assurances that it will abide by international rules and norms.”

    “I believe that Turkey can be an important player in trying to move Iran in that direction,” the president was quoted as saying by AFP.

    Obama also praised Turkey for its role in Afghanistan, where it has some 1,700 troops.

  • BAKU UPSET OVER LACK OF KARABAKH PROGRESS,

    BAKU UPSET OVER LACK OF KARABAKH PROGRESS,

    AZERBAIJAN: BAKU UPSET OVER LACK OF KARABAKH PROGRESS, STEPS UP ANTI-WESTERN RHETORIC
    Shahin Abbasov 12/04/09

    Azerbaijani officials have taken aim at the West in recent weeks, in what some analysts believe could be an attempt to secure Russia’s support for a Baku-friendly settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process.

    The most surprising proposal in recent days to come out of Baku was a call for Russia to reestablish a military presence in Azerbaijan; Russian troops departed the country in 1993, and no mention had been made, until now, about their possible return.

    On November 26, MP Gudrat Hasanguliyev proposed that Azerbaijan should join the Collective Security Treaty Organization, a Moscow-dominated military pact, and allow Russia to establish a military base in Azerbaijan. Hasanguliyev, a leader of the United Popular Front of Azerbaijan Party, presented the idea as a trade-off for Russian recognition of “Azerbaijan’s sovereignty over Karabakh.”

    Although Baku’s national security strategy, approved in 2007, clearly defines “pursuing Euro-Atlantic integration” as a diplomatic priority for Azerbaijan, Hasanguliyev and others now complain that Baku has received little from the West in exchange for its interest in closer ties. Georgia’s own experience with the Atlantic Alliance suggests that Azerbaijan would never gain NATO membership, Hasanguliyev contended. Baku has not applied to join the Brussels-based military alliance.

    Representatives of the government and the governing Yeni Azerbaijan Party have not disavowed Hasanguliyev’s statement. Moreover, the statement appears to be part of a trend. At a November 20 conference in Baku organized by the presidential administration’s Center for Strategic Research, the United States and European Union came in for heavy criticism for their alleged failure to resolve the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute. Russia, which mediates the talks along with France and the United States, escaped censure. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

    The pressure recently put on Armenia and Turkey to sign protocols on rapprochement “has never happened on the Karabakh issue,” charged Novruz Mammadov, head of the presidential administration’s Foreign Policy Department. Such an imbalance could lead to changes in Azerbaijan’s foreign policy, he suggested. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

    Mammadov went on to accuse the West of ingratitude for Azerbaijan’s cooperation with the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline. The lack of economic assistance for the $1 billion Mammadov says Azerbaijan lost from the 2008 economic crisis shows that “the West forgot us and helped Armenia,” he said.

    Deputy Parliamentary Speaker Ziyafet Askerov went a step further: Since force has been shown to be more effective than international law — a reference to the 2008 Georgia-Russia war and recognition of Kosovo — “the Karabakh conflict [could] be solved by the Azerbaijani army,” he threatened. “US foreign policy has become a hostage of the Armenian lobby,” he added.

    Discontent over Western criticism of the trial of two Azerbaijani bloggers – “Western media wrote more about the bloggers’ trial than about the Karabakh conflict since it began,” Novruz Mammadov claimed – and perceived NATO ingratitude for the 90 Azerbaijani peacekeepers serving in Afghanistan has added to the chill.

    Baku analysts are divided over the cause of this rhetoric.

    Azerbaijan’s irritation that more progress has been made on rapprochement between Armenia and Turkey than with the Karabakh peace process, now in its 15th year, could be driving Baku’s criticism of the West, believes Elhan Shahingolu, director of the Atlas Center for Political Research. “After the Turkish-Armenian protocols, Azerbaijan feels itself isolated and needs fast progress on the Karabakh issue,” Shahinoglu said.

    Russia’s absence from the criticism of the Karabakh mediators indicates that Baku hopes that “increased volumes of gas supplies and wider economic cooperation” mean that “Moscow would help in the Karabakh conflict,” Shahinoglu added. Annual trade turnover between Azerbaijan and Russia currently stands at $2.5 billion.

    After a November 24 meeting with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev at which the Karabakh conflict was discussed, an upbeat Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev declared that “if every country would have such relations as exist between Russia and Azerbaijan, there would be no problems in the world,” news agencies reported.

    Another political analyst, Zafar Guliyev, believes that more than the Karabakh conflict stands behind Baku’s anti-Western statements. An uptick in Western criticism of Azerbaijan’s democratization and human rights record – particularly the recent sentencing of two youth activists to prison terms — could play a role, too, he said. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

    As Baku sees the West start to stick its neck out on such issues, the Azerbaijani government feels obliged to nudge it back into place, Guliyev noted. “In 2009, the Western powers and Turkey undertook efforts to reinforce their positions in the South Caucasus, and it is likely that some forces in the Azerbaijani government are concerned that the balance between the West and Russia [in the region], which always helped Baku to maneuver, could be broken,” Guliyev said.

    Both experts, however, believe that the rhetoric does not signal an official foreign policy line. The comments “so far” are “more muddled and emotional statements than a defined concept,” noted Guliyev.

    Shahinoglu, who opposes closer ties with Moscow, also believes that Baku is unlikely to change horses in mid-stream. “Azerbaijan has been pursuing Euro-Atlantic integration for more than 15 years and such abrupt changes now would not deliver anything positive,” he said.

    Editor’s Note: Shahin Abbasov is a freelance correspondent based in Baku. He is also a board member of the Open Society Institute-Azerbaijan.

    Posted December 4, 2009 © Eurasianet