In the years of independence, our army has come a long way in its evolution, starting from the day it was established in the early 1990s, in an era of chaos because of a weak government, political instability and a heavy war with Armenia.
The Azerbaijani army went through the crucible of the first Karabakh war, but the defeats never broke the spirit of our soldiers and commanders, on the contrary, they tempered them. The right lessons were learned from the past mistakes, and the national army came to the second Karabakh war fully prepared: well-armed, well-trained, melded together by iron discipline and high morale, under the leadership of talented commanders headed by the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, President Ilham Aliyev, it won a crushing victory over the Armenian invaders.
But even after this brilliant victory in a war that lasted only 44 days, the army-building process continues today, as the command of the national army led by the victorious Commander-in-Chief refuses to rest on their laurels. Thus, the army building took on an even broader scope. “The Patriotic War ended with a complete victory for the Azerbaijani state. But despite this, more steps are being taken to build up the army after the war, and there is a great need for that. After all, the geopolitical situation in the world is becoming increasingly strained; there are new emerging threats in our region, and revanchist forces are rising in Armenia again,” President Ilham Aliyev said in his address to the personnel at the ceremony of presenting the combat flag of a new commando military unit of the Ministry of Defense.
Today, new threats to the security of our region are becoming more and more systemic. Against the backdrop of crises in the world, the collective West is stepping up its policies to hinder the consolidation of regional players’ actorship, and Azerbaijan is not the last on the list. As a result, the situation in the South Caucasus region is increasingly beset by conflicts, with new threats, challenges and risks affecting the interests of Azerbaijan growing. Given the geopolitical situation in the world, there is a great need to continue to build the army and strengthen defense capabilities.
Farid Shafiyev, Chairman of the Board of the Center of Analysis of International Relations of Azerbaijan, shared his views on the new threats and prospects for a peace treaty with Armenia in an interview with Bakinskiy Rabochiy.
Recently a lot has been said about challenges and threats to Azerbaijan’s national security. What are the most dangerous threats you could name?
Obviously, the first problem has to do with Armenia, with the revanchist forces in that country, with the presence of illegal Armenian armed groups in the Karabakh region of the Republic of Azerbaijan.
Another dangerous threat comes from Iran. There are still some difficulties in Azerbaijan-Iran relations. However, Tehran is now taking certain steps at the diplomatic level to reduce tensions. Some proposals have been made by them, but no concrete actions have been taken. We are also waiting for the results of the investigation into the terrorist attack on our embassy in the Iranian capital. A thorough investigation of this terrorist attack and providing Baku with all the necessary information on its results is our most important precondition for the normalization of relations with Iran.
Even though Tehran is now trying to ease tensions in bilateral relations through diplomatic means, the rhetoric of the Iranian ruling elite is generally aimed against Azerbaijani statehood.
Another threat stems from the negative effect of the Russian-Ukrainian war and Russia’s confrontation with the West. I am talking about the negative effects of instability, such as the recent events involving Prigozhin in Russia. Of course, all these events do not affect us directly, but they do affect us indirectly. For example, not only we but the whole world is facing the economic consequences of this war, in the form of rising inflation. Also playing a role in the overall instability is the problem of migration caused by the hostilities in Ukraine, which has led to millions of refugees fleeing the horrors of war to Europe.
Can revanchist forces in Armenia really become a threat to Azerbaijan after such a resounding victory of our army in the second Karabakh war?
I think that as far as the Armenian revanchism is concerned we should look not one or two or three years ahead, but further, 10-15-20 years into the future. Although official Irevan has recently recognized the Karabakh region as part of the Republic of Azerbaijan, these words and recognition have not yet been documented on paper.
On the other hand, Armenia is trying to exert pressure on Azerbaijan through third forces. In particular, we can see the actions of PACE, measures being taken against us in a number of international institutions. Thus, there is a big difference between declarations and real actions of Armenia. Therefore, when we talk about Armenian revanchism, we do not mean that it will happen, say, in a year or two, but in the long term.
As you know, there was a certain upsurge in the negotiation process in May and early June, there were numerous meetings in different formats and at different negotiating venues. Do you feel progress has been made in the negotiation process?
There are, of course, certain developments with the document. But at the same time, a problem arises when Irevan uses various pretexts to attempt to insert the “Karabakh issue” into the document. Baku sees it as an attempt to keep the “Karabakh issue” on the international agenda in order to try to separate the Karabakh region from Azerbaijan again in the future through certain political actions. And in the future political actions will be followed by provocative ones and use of force.
There is talk, however, that progress has been made in unblocking transportation routes…
The talks on this subject have been going on for two and a half years. The first document on this was signed in Moscow back on January 11, 2021. But for all the talk of progress, we have yet to see anything like it in reality. While Azerbaijan is building roads to Armenia at full speed, nothing has been done on the other side of the border yet. This is why I am very cautious about the bright outlook, because as of now Yerevan is only talking but doing nothing.
The same applies to the meeting of the deputy prime ministers in Moscow that you mentioned: yes, there is some agreement between the sides, but we are interested in practical steps, which are not there yet.
New meetings within the negotiation process are expected next month. There is an opinion that a peace treaty between Azerbaijan and Armenia will be signed before the end of the year. Do you share this optimistic view?
Unfortunately, being well familiar with Armenia’s patterns of behavior, it is very difficult to make predictions. If you recall, last year many predicted that a peace treaty would be signed by the end of the year, but it never happened. Irevan often backs out of agreements that have already been reached; everything is very unstable, and therefore it is impossible to make clear predictions.
Roman Temnikov
Translated from Bakinskiy Rabochiy
