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AZERBAIJAN RULES OUT HELP FOR US MILITARY ACTION AGAINST IRAN
Agence France Presse -- English
April 26, 2006 Wednesday 4:23 PM GMT
WASHINGTON, April 26 2006
Visiting Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev on Wednesday ruled out
his country taking part in any possible military operations against
neighboring Iran and said resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
with Armenia was a top priority for his government.
"Azerbajian will not be engaged in any kind of potential operation
against Iran and our officials in the past, including myself, have
made (this) very clear," Aliyev told an audience at the Council on
Foreign Relations in Washington. "Therefore I think it is time to
stop speculating on this issue."
Aliyev, whose official visit here is his first since his election to
succeed his father in October 2003, said his country has a bilateral
agreement with Tehran that clearly forbids either country from staging
aggression against the other from their respective territories.
His comments came ahead of a meeting with US President George W. Bush
on Friday during which the nuclear stand-off with Iran is expected
to be raised.
There has been speculation that Azerbaijan, which is strategically
located between Iran and Russia and which has troops alongside US
forces in Iraq as well as Afghanistan and Kosovo, could be asked by
Washington to back any potential military action against Iran should
diplomacy on the nuclear issue fail.
Aliyev, whose White House meeting with Bush has long been sought
by his government as a way to boost his stature, said he planned to
discuss a wide range of topics with US officials, including bilateral
relations, energy and security issues as well as the conflict in the
Nagorno-Karabakh region.
He said he hoped Washington would help revive the peace process in
Nagorno-Karabakh, which is a disputed part of Azerbaijani territory
that has been controlled since the early 1990s by its majority
ethnic-Armenian population.
Aliyev made clear that his country would not relinquish the territory
and said any settlement would have to guarantee the return of
Azerbaijani refugees to the region while protecting the rights of
the local ethnic Armenian population.
"I think it's time for the Armenian leadership to behave like
statesemen, to think what will happen in five or 10 years if the
conflict is not resolved," he said. "The patience of the Azerbaijani
people has a limit.
"We are demanding Armenia return peacefully the land that belongs
to us."
The 44-year-old leader also brushed aside criticism concerning his
autocratic rule and flawed parliamentary elections in November saying
that he saw no chance of any "colour" revolution in Azerbaijan.
"For that to happen, people have to be unhappy with the government,"
he said, pointing to the country's economic prosperity.
US officials, who have been criticised for inviting Aliyev to
Washington in light of the administration's much-touted democracy
agenda, said democratic reforms would top the agenda during the visit.
"We have said, and we mean it, that to elevate our relationship
with Azerbaijan to a qualitatively new level (...) there needs to
be sustained progress on democracy," Matthew Bryza, Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, said.
The US administration is keenly interested in energy-rich Azerbaijan
as a way to offset dependence on Russia by European markets. The
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, which is expected to become
operational soon, is designed to avoid shipping oil through congested
Turkish straits while also bypassing Russia's pipeline network.
Agence France Presse -- English
April 26, 2006 Wednesday 4:23 PM GMT
WASHINGTON, April 26 2006
Visiting Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev on Wednesday ruled out
his country taking part in any possible military operations against
neighboring Iran and said resolving the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
with Armenia was a top priority for his government.
"Azerbajian will not be engaged in any kind of potential operation
against Iran and our officials in the past, including myself, have
made (this) very clear," Aliyev told an audience at the Council on
Foreign Relations in Washington. "Therefore I think it is time to
stop speculating on this issue."
Aliyev, whose official visit here is his first since his election to
succeed his father in October 2003, said his country has a bilateral
agreement with Tehran that clearly forbids either country from staging
aggression against the other from their respective territories.
His comments came ahead of a meeting with US President George W. Bush
on Friday during which the nuclear stand-off with Iran is expected
to be raised.
There has been speculation that Azerbaijan, which is strategically
located between Iran and Russia and which has troops alongside US
forces in Iraq as well as Afghanistan and Kosovo, could be asked by
Washington to back any potential military action against Iran should
diplomacy on the nuclear issue fail.
Aliyev, whose White House meeting with Bush has long been sought
by his government as a way to boost his stature, said he planned to
discuss a wide range of topics with US officials, including bilateral
relations, energy and security issues as well as the conflict in the
Nagorno-Karabakh region.
He said he hoped Washington would help revive the peace process in
Nagorno-Karabakh, which is a disputed part of Azerbaijani territory
that has been controlled since the early 1990s by its majority
ethnic-Armenian population.
Aliyev made clear that his country would not relinquish the territory
and said any settlement would have to guarantee the return of
Azerbaijani refugees to the region while protecting the rights of
the local ethnic Armenian population.
"I think it's time for the Armenian leadership to behave like
statesemen, to think what will happen in five or 10 years if the
conflict is not resolved," he said. "The patience of the Azerbaijani
people has a limit.
"We are demanding Armenia return peacefully the land that belongs
to us."
The 44-year-old leader also brushed aside criticism concerning his
autocratic rule and flawed parliamentary elections in November saying
that he saw no chance of any "colour" revolution in Azerbaijan.
"For that to happen, people have to be unhappy with the government,"
he said, pointing to the country's economic prosperity.
US officials, who have been criticised for inviting Aliyev to
Washington in light of the administration's much-touted democracy
agenda, said democratic reforms would top the agenda during the visit.
"We have said, and we mean it, that to elevate our relationship
with Azerbaijan to a qualitatively new level (...) there needs to
be sustained progress on democracy," Matthew Bryza, Deputy Assistant
Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, said.
The US administration is keenly interested in energy-rich Azerbaijan
as a way to offset dependence on Russia by European markets. The
Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, which is expected to become
operational soon, is designed to avoid shipping oil through congested
Turkish straits while also bypassing Russia's pipeline network.