US MILITARY IN AZERBAIJAN
PanArmenian News
Nov 22 2004
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ As reported by Independent Military Observer Russian
newspaper on November 19, over 50 NATO servicemen, mostly Americans,
were quartered in the village of Chukhanly of the Salyani region
of Azerbaijan in a training center belonging to Azeri the Defense
Ministry. According to the newspaper, beginning with the next year, the
US military are going to implement in Azerbaijan a program analogous
to the one carried out in Georgia. Member of the Azerbaijani Defense
Ministry press service Ilgar Verdiyev confirmed the information to the
journalists, stating, however, that the foreign servicemen are arriving
in Azerbaijan only for the participation in concrete projects aimed at
Partnership for Peace NATO program realization. Yet head of the press
service Ramiz Melikov completely refuted the information and said that
he does not possess any data of the US instructors who are allegedly to
train Azeri soldiers. At the same time Azeri Foreign Ministry Deputy
Araz Azimov does not rule out the possibility of stationing US mobile
forces in Azerbaijan. Former high rank official of the Azeri Defense
Ministry Uzeir Jafarov holds the opinion that the Azerbaijan-NATO
cooperation long ago exceeded the limits of Partnership for Peace
program. In Jafarov’s words, the program similar to the Georgian
one is in active preparation in Azerbaijan at present and will to
all appearances be launched in 2005. However Azerbaijani FM Elmar
Mamedyarov stated that “Azerbaijan is not negotiating on dislocating
foreign military bases in its territory”. “A military base is a
stationary object that cannot be deployed during one night. Multi-stage
negotiations are needed for it”, the Minister noted. As expert of
the East-West Center of Political Research Azer Rashidoglu told the
newspaper reporter, the EU is expected to unanimously speak against
the US anti-Iranian operation. (The complete version of the article
read at ). To remind,
the hearsay on using the Azeri territories for probable US military
operations against Iran revived recently. As for stationary military
bases in Azerbaijan, according the Pentagon new military doctrine
on mobile bases, there will be no need in them. Thus, nominally,
military bases in their classical meaning might not exist.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress