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  • Azerbaijan's President Synchronizes Watches With Turkey

    AZERBAIJAN'S PRESIDENT SYNCHRONIZES WATCHES WITH TURKEY
    By Vladimir Socor

    Eurasia Daily Monitor
    Nov 10 2008
    DC

    Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev visited Turkey on November 5 and
    6 as his first official trip abroad since reelection, underscoring
    the two countries' special relationship. While traditional, that
    relationship has evolved substantially during Ilham Aliyev's presidency
    and is no longer asymmetrical. As he remarked during his visit to
    Ankara, "Turkey supported Azerbaijan during hard times, but in the
    meantime Azerbaijan has become stronger and is contributing fully to
    the bilateral relationship" (www.day.az via ANS-Press, November 6).

    Aliyev and Minister of Foreign Affairs Elmar Mammadyarov synchronized
    watches with their Turkish counterparts with regard to accelerating
    talks on the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict and follow-up negotiations.

    In statements issued during Aliyev's visit, Turkish President
    Abdullah Gul and the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs welcomed,
    apparently without reservations, the Moscow Declaration of November
    2 about a settlement of the Karabakh conflict signed by Aliyev,
    Armenian President Serge Sarkisian, and their host Russian President
    Dmitry Medvedev (see EDM, November 4). According to the two Turkish
    statements, the Moscow Declaration fits in well with Turkey's vision
    about resolving that conflict peacefully, on the basis of international
    law and direct high-level dialogue between Azerbaijan and Armenia. As
    a member of the OSCE's Minsk Group, which is mandated to provide a
    framework for negotiations in that conflict, Turkey will continue
    to work with both parties toward a solution. According to both
    Turkish statements, the "Platform for Security and Stability in the
    Caucasus"--a concept that Ankara outlined in mid-August, prompted in
    part by Russia's invasion of Georgia--is consistent with the Moscow
    Declaration and can also be used as a basis for negotiations in
    the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict (Anatolia News Agency, November 5;
    Turkish Daily News, November 6).

    Aliyev's comments on the Moscow Declaration were more nuanced but on
    the whole positive. He described it as a good basis for continuing
    negotiations, drawing attention to the document's salient points
    from Azerbaijan's perspective. The declaration makes reference to
    a stage-by-stage political settlement; and it endorses past and
    recent resolutions on that conflict by international organizations,
    adopted in compliance with international legal norms (an allusion
    to Azerbaijan's territorial integrity and inviolability of its
    internationally recognized borders). Aliyev made clear, however,
    what stage-by-stage must signify: First, withdrawal of "occupation
    forces from Azerbaijani territories" and the return to their homes
    there of Azerbaijani citizens who were forced to flee. Afterward,
    the status of Karabakh should be discussed, proceeding in any case
    from Azerbaijan's territorial integrity.

    By the same token Aliyev underscored that "Implementation of any
    region-wide project, political or economic, is impossible without
    our participation and consent. Energy and transportation projects,
    important for the region and the world, are being implemented at our
    initiative." This is an indirect answer to those who advise, urge, and
    occasionally pressure Azerbaijan to include Armenia in such project,
    while the occupation of Azerbaijani territories continues and the
    ethnic cleansing has yet to be reversed. Aliyev made these points in
    his address to Turkey's Grand National Assembly (parliament) and in
    other remarks delivered during the visit (ANS, APA, November 6).

    During Aliyev's visit, Gul stated that "energy and transportation
    projects are open to the entire region and can bring peace and
    stability" (Anatolia News Agency, November 5; Turkish Daily News,
    November 6). At the public level it did not seem fully clear whether
    Gul had in mind a sequenced process, whereby Armenia could be
    included in those projects after, not before, meeting the criteria
    of a good-neighborly relationship with Azerbaijan and Turkey.

    In its November 7 issue, the Ankara newspaper Today's Zaman, which
    is close to circles in the governing AKP party, cited "diplomatic
    sources" as saying that Gul intended to host a tripartite summit
    with the Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents, theoretically by early
    April. Other Turkish media sources added to that version. The agenda
    of such a summit would, like the Moscow summit of November 2, focus
    on the Karabakh conflict but would not be confined to that. The time
    and venue of such an event would be coordinated with Yerevan.

    That same day, however, Sarkisian turned down the idea. He argued
    that Turkey could not be a mediator because it was not a co-chair of
    the 12-country Minsk Group. Under the Moscow Declaration, the Group's
    co-chairs (Russia, the United States, and France), not the other member
    countries, shall act as mediators. Apparently backtracking, Turkey's
    MFA announced through a spokesman that Turkey would welcome visits
    by the presidents of both Armenia and Azerbaijan but at this time was
    not trying to arrange a tripartite summit (Today's Zaman, November 7;
    Arminfo, PanArmenianNet, Anatolia News Agency, November 7, 8).

    On November 7 back in Baku, Aliyev received the Turkish Armed Forces
    Chief of Staff, General Ilker Basbug, to discuss continuing military
    cooperation, building on the successes achieved (AzerTaj, November
    7). Alluding to the Georgia crisis, Azerbaijan Defense Minister General
    Safar Abiyev noted during Basbug's visit that ongoing developments
    in the region made bilateral Azerbaijan-Turkey relations even more
    necessary than before.
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