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EurasiaNet.org
March 3 2013
Saakashvili, Hasanov On The Russian Threat To Azerbaijan
March 3, 2013 - 11:54am, by Joshua Kucera
When Georgian President MIkheil Saakashvili made an official visit to
Azerbaijan last week, he took with him a bit of his unique brand of
anti-Russia rhetoric, saying that Baku today faces a similar threat
from Russia as has Tbilisi. From Civil.ge:
After visiting Baku, President Saakashvili said that Russia was
preparing the same "scenario" for Azerbaijan, which was applied
against Georgia in last year's parliamentary elections when, as he put
it, "oligarchs, Russian funds, blackmailing and provocations" were
used.
In particular, Saakashvili mentioned the establishment of a diaspora
organization in Russia made up of rich businessmen of Azeri origin,
which he said posed the same sort of threat as did Bidzina
Ivanishvili, the Georgian-born businessman who made billions in Russia
and then became prime minister of Georgia on a platform of improving
ties with Russia. Saakashvili also noted that Ivanishvili's government
pardoned an ethnic Armenian activist, which he said was done "to
please" Russia.
Azerbaijan has traditionally been very careful not to provoke Russia;
while it similarly feels a threat to its sovereignty from Moscow, it
has followed a somewhat more multi-vectored approach than has Georgia,
maintaining good relations with Russia, alongside its ties to Turkey,
Europe, the U.S, Israel. and others. And Russia, for its part, has not
taken an aggressive position against Baku, seeming more interested in
maintaining a regional balance of power between Armenia and
Azerbaijan. So it's not surprising, as the opposition news site
Contact.az notes, that officials in Baku publicly ignored
Saakashvili's comments.
But in a meeting with a group of Turkish reporters in Baku, Deputy
Prime Minister Ali Hasanov made the relatively rare claim that in a
fight to regain Nagorno Karabakh, the breakaway territory that has
been controlled by Armenian forces for two decades, Azerbaijan would
not be fighting just Armenians but Russians:
`President Ilham Aliyev has always promised a military solution to the
[Nagorno-Karabakh] conflict and he still has the issue on the agenda.
The option of a military solution is always on the table, but the most
important thing is how this kind of operation will be carried out. We
need to become much stronger so that if we become involved in combat
in Nagorno-Karabakh we can stand up to Russian troops, because that is
who we will have to face. Did Armenia occupy our territories? Do you
think Armenia's power is sufficient for that?' asked Hasanov....
Recalling his home city, which is also in the occupied territories of
Azerbaijan, Hasanov said the occupation was accomplished with the
military support of Russia. `I saw Russian soldiers get out of tanks
and celebrate their victory with champagne.'
Russian support of Armenia twenty-plus years ago certainly does not
guarantee Russian support in a future war. In theory, Armenia's
membership in the Collective Security Treaty Organization obligates
Russia (and other CSTO members) to come to Armenia's aid if it were
attacked, but 1. if the war were limited to Karabakh (still
internationally recognized as Azerbaijani territory), that wouldn't be
a factor and 2. even if the war did spread to Armenia, it's not hard
to imagine Russia thinking that it was not worth it to get involved.
But if Hasanov is telling the truth, and Azerbaijan really believes
that it needs to built up its military to be able to match Russia's,
when does he think that would ever happen? Or is this a pretext, meant
to buy time after so many years of bragging about Azerbaijan's growing
military might that people might start wondering why Azerbaijan
doesn't pull the trigger already?
http://www.eurasianet.org/node/66630
March 3 2013
Saakashvili, Hasanov On The Russian Threat To Azerbaijan
March 3, 2013 - 11:54am, by Joshua Kucera
When Georgian President MIkheil Saakashvili made an official visit to
Azerbaijan last week, he took with him a bit of his unique brand of
anti-Russia rhetoric, saying that Baku today faces a similar threat
from Russia as has Tbilisi. From Civil.ge:
After visiting Baku, President Saakashvili said that Russia was
preparing the same "scenario" for Azerbaijan, which was applied
against Georgia in last year's parliamentary elections when, as he put
it, "oligarchs, Russian funds, blackmailing and provocations" were
used.
In particular, Saakashvili mentioned the establishment of a diaspora
organization in Russia made up of rich businessmen of Azeri origin,
which he said posed the same sort of threat as did Bidzina
Ivanishvili, the Georgian-born businessman who made billions in Russia
and then became prime minister of Georgia on a platform of improving
ties with Russia. Saakashvili also noted that Ivanishvili's government
pardoned an ethnic Armenian activist, which he said was done "to
please" Russia.
Azerbaijan has traditionally been very careful not to provoke Russia;
while it similarly feels a threat to its sovereignty from Moscow, it
has followed a somewhat more multi-vectored approach than has Georgia,
maintaining good relations with Russia, alongside its ties to Turkey,
Europe, the U.S, Israel. and others. And Russia, for its part, has not
taken an aggressive position against Baku, seeming more interested in
maintaining a regional balance of power between Armenia and
Azerbaijan. So it's not surprising, as the opposition news site
Contact.az notes, that officials in Baku publicly ignored
Saakashvili's comments.
But in a meeting with a group of Turkish reporters in Baku, Deputy
Prime Minister Ali Hasanov made the relatively rare claim that in a
fight to regain Nagorno Karabakh, the breakaway territory that has
been controlled by Armenian forces for two decades, Azerbaijan would
not be fighting just Armenians but Russians:
`President Ilham Aliyev has always promised a military solution to the
[Nagorno-Karabakh] conflict and he still has the issue on the agenda.
The option of a military solution is always on the table, but the most
important thing is how this kind of operation will be carried out. We
need to become much stronger so that if we become involved in combat
in Nagorno-Karabakh we can stand up to Russian troops, because that is
who we will have to face. Did Armenia occupy our territories? Do you
think Armenia's power is sufficient for that?' asked Hasanov....
Recalling his home city, which is also in the occupied territories of
Azerbaijan, Hasanov said the occupation was accomplished with the
military support of Russia. `I saw Russian soldiers get out of tanks
and celebrate their victory with champagne.'
Russian support of Armenia twenty-plus years ago certainly does not
guarantee Russian support in a future war. In theory, Armenia's
membership in the Collective Security Treaty Organization obligates
Russia (and other CSTO members) to come to Armenia's aid if it were
attacked, but 1. if the war were limited to Karabakh (still
internationally recognized as Azerbaijani territory), that wouldn't be
a factor and 2. even if the war did spread to Armenia, it's not hard
to imagine Russia thinking that it was not worth it to get involved.
But if Hasanov is telling the truth, and Azerbaijan really believes
that it needs to built up its military to be able to match Russia's,
when does he think that would ever happen? Or is this a pretext, meant
to buy time after so many years of bragging about Azerbaijan's growing
military might that people might start wondering why Azerbaijan
doesn't pull the trigger already?
http://www.eurasianet.org/node/66630