Armenian paper reports Azeri criticism of Baku leadership

Aravot, Yerevan
10 Mar 05

Text of Naira Mamikonyan’s report in Armenian newspaper Aravot on 10
March headlined “Oil is no panacea”

In an interview to Aravot, Azeri politician Hikmat Hacizada says
that oil is a scourge for Azerbaijan: the oil interests of the
international community prevent it from duly assessing the democracy
and human rights situation in the country. While top Azeri officials
enjoy the benefits of the oil business, ordinary Azeris are suffering
from the pains of looming poverty.

A participant in an international workshop in Batumi last week, a
member of the Legal Education Society of Azerbaijan, Ellada Siriyeva,
is of the same opinion. She says that Azeri society is facing many
problems with universal corruption and a monopolized economy being
the biggest ones.

“In Azerbaijan there are monopolies in many economic spheres:
timber, the import of some food items, drugs, even nappies – which
is a serious obstacle to the development of small and medium-sized
business,” Siriyeva says. There are anti-monopoly laws, but they are
not applied because of a lack of enforcement mechanisms.”

“Azerbaijan’s 8m population is concentrated in Baku and its
neighbourhood,” Siriyeva says. “This situation is made even worse
by the problem of refugees who refuse to be settled in stagnating
regions. The measures to fight trafficking in women and children
are scarcely effective.” But still there is no mass emigration,
Siriyeva notes.

She considers free elections, one of the pillars of a democratic
state, to be Azerbaijan’s key political task. The Azeris have avoided
assessing the elections in 2003. “Freedom of speech is a big problem
in Azerbaijan. The local authorities, who are controlled by the
executive power mostly, are persecuting and pressurizing those who
freely express their views.” “There are laws, some of them are good,
but few are effective. A country where the law does not have supremacy
cannot ensure freedom of speech, human rights and free elections,”
Siriyeva says, noting that these problems are closely interwoven and
should be resolved as a whole.

Neither Azerbaijan nor the whole region can effectively develop, as
long as there is an unsettled problem like the Karabakh conflict,
Siriyeva says. Speaking of external pressure she notes Russia’s
negative role in the issue of division of the Caspian Sea. She is
displeased with what the international community is doing to settle
the Karabakh conflict. “They talk of settlement for several years,
then they change the Minsk Group co-chairs and start talking again.
The new co-chairs need time to understand the problem. All this is
damaging the region. There is no confidence for starting economic
cooperation.

“Of course there is progress too: the international community is
supporting reforms in education, economy, human rights protection.”

In his turn a representative of Turan news agency, Anar Qanbayli,
corrects Siriyeva a little, noting that in 1990-95 Azerbaijan was in
economic stagnation and social crisis because of military operations.
Drastic reforms started after the 1994 cease-fire and 1998. He says
that in a short time his country recorded large macroeconomic growth
and embarked on the road to democratization.

Qanbayli does not agree with Armenia linking the Karabakh conflict
settlement with the legitimacy of the Azeri authorities. Whoever is
in power in Azerbaijan will adopt the same settlement principles and
terms the present government is applying. Even though Qanbayli does
not openly demand that Armenia withdraw its troops from occupied
Azeri territory, he implies that these conditions are known.