Caucaz.com, Georgia
Aug 26 2005
Azerbaijan. Forthcoming general election: the crackdown continues
By Franck MADIOT, freelance political journalist (Russia, Central
Asia, The Balkans) in Paris
On 26/08/2005
(Translated by Michèle-Ann OKOLOTOWICZ)
© Yeni Fikir
Three months away from the general election set for 6 November 2005,
the Azeri authorities are sparing no effort to contain democratic
impulses. The recent arrest of Ruslan Bachirli is just further proof.
At 27, Ruslan Bachirli heads Yeni Fikir (New Thinking), one of the
main Azeri opposition movements, following in the footsteps of
movements led by a youth hungry for political reform such as those
initiated in Serbia with Otpor!, followed by Kmara in Georgia and
Pora in Ukraine.
Arrested on 3 August, this charismatic young man is suspected of
having plotted a coup in Azerbaijan, with the backing of Armenian
intelligence agencies. This crackdown occurs just as popular protests
are multiplying against the background spectre of an `orange
revolution’. These past few weeks, the country’s authorities have
been quick to launch a widespread public relations campaign on the
`democratisation’ of the media in the country in order to attempt to
deflect the American strategy of expansionism through democracy.
But the Ruslan Bashirli incident has two sides to the story. Through
the voice of their Attorney general, Zakir Garalov, who claims to
have a video tape of the incident, the authorities first declared on
4 August that Ruslan Bachirli was given 2,000 dollars by Armenian
secret service agents in Tblisi on 28 and 29 July 2005 to finance
demonstrations in Azerbaijan. A further 20,000 dollars were promised.
Affiliated to the Popular Front, one of the country’s main opposition
parties, Ruslan Bachirli has allowed the Azeri authorities to use the
opportunity of this arrest to point the finger at the mastermind
behind this operation, namely Ali Kerimli, a serious opponent in the
forthcoming elections… The authorities have also claimed that Ruslan
Bachirli worked for the National Democratic Institute, an American
organisation. Thus, the stage is set: Azerbaijan is neither Ukraine
nor Georgia or Kirghizia.
Elchin Garalov, Ruslan Bachirli’s lawyer, has not denied that the
video exists but explained that the protagonists were members of
Georgian and Armenian democratic movements, and not agents. He added
that what was said during the dinner in Tbilisi, where alcohol ran
freely, had been quoted out of context. He also added that the money
paid to Ruslan Bachirli, who was drunk at the time, was returned the
following day by his client.
However, an important question was raised by Bachirli’s lawyer: how
come the so-called Armenian agents, who allegedly filmed the dinner
to encourage Ruslan Bachirli to stick to his promises, gave the video
recording to Osman Almuderov, Bachirli’s aide, also present at the
dinner? Almuderov supposedly rushed the next day to deliver the
recording to the Azeri authorities because he did not want to work
with the Armenians against his own country.
The situation is not very clear, Bachirli’s defenders are today
trying to understand who is responsible for this sting operation and
what its outcome will be. Is it a ploy to discredit Ali Kerimli and
the Popular Front or an attempt to postpone the general elections
based on political and security issues?
Another hypothesis is that minority factions within the political
apparatus organised this imbroglio to destabilise President Ilham
Aliyev and to damage his credibility in the eyes of international
bodies before the elections.
One thing remains certain: the events in Georgia, Ukraine and
Kirghizia will henceforth weigh heavily on all the upcoming elections
in the post-Soviet states.