FREIZER: “THE US SHOULD BE CONCERNED IN NK CONFLICT SETTLEMENT”

Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan
April 26 2006

“Energy and security issues are likely to dominate the 28 April meeting
between President Bush and President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan.

It will be Aliyev’s first visit since becoming head of the oil-rich
state bordering both Russia and Iran, and Teheran’s nuclear ambitions
are undoubtedly one of the main reasons Aliyev has been invited to the
White House.” International Crises Group Caucasus project leader Sabina
Freizer has told APA while expressing her attitude to Azerbaijani
president Ilham Aliyev’s visit to the US. Sabina Freizer stated that
if the U.S. is keen to protect its energy and security interests,
the main issue on the table should be the unresolved conflict in
Nagorno-Karabakh. For more than a decade, only a shaky cease-fire
has kept Armenia and Azerbaijan from resuming their full-scale
fighting over the small mountainous territory wedged between them and
Iran. The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline and soon to be completed
Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline, which Washington sees as critical
to the West’s energy security, pass within 30 miles of this flashpoint.

In the past months, President Aliyev has intensified his bellicose
rhetoric, threatening to withdraw from peace talks and to militarily
recapture all territories currently occupied by Armenian backed
forces. He doubled the 2005 military budget to $600 million in 2006,
over 16% of Azerbaijan’s total budget. He has also pledged to make
military spending equal to the entire state budget of Armenia, and,
propped up by oil revenues, the Azeri leader’s threat is very real.

In Washington President Aliyev should be told clearly that a military
resolution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is unacceptable. Instead,
the U.S. Government should – while making clear that it will be
pressing Armenia equally strongly – push Azerbaijan to accept now
the principles of a comprehensive peace deal which would include
the renunciation of the use of force, the incremental withdrawal
of Armenian-backed forces from all occupied territories around
Nagorno-Karabakh, the safe and voluntary return of all displaced
persons, the reopening of all transport and trade routes closed
as a result to the conflict, and a guarantee that the people of
Nagorno-Karabakh will be given the right to self-determination based
on a referendum to be held after clear conditions are met.

This is close to what the Organization for Security and Cooperation
in Europe proposed in February, but there was little international
pressure on Armenia and Azerbaijan to encourage them to sign the
deal. As a first step President Aliyev should allow people-to-people
contacts between the Armenian and Azerbaijani sides.

Until now, the Bush Administration has claimed to have a
three-dimensional approach to Azerbaijan, focusing on security,
energy, and freedom through reform. President Aliyev was not granted
an earlier visit to the White House because the 2003 presidential
elections were considered to be seriously flawed and were followed by a
violent crackdown on the opposition. The 2005 Azerbaijani Parliamentary
Elections were another disappointment, which should have precluded an
invitation to Aliyev less than six months after they were held. Some
of the three dimensions are clearly more important than others.

Even as democratic reform was lagging, Secretary of Defense Donald
Rumsfeld traveled to Baku three times in 2003-2005. Most observers
in Baku consider these visits to be cementing the relationships that
could ease the way for the possible deployment of American troops
in Azerbaijan to be used in actions against Iran. Today’s invitation
may be part of the Bush Administration’s attempts to ratchet up the
pressure on Tehran. Interestingly, however, Aliyev is preparing to
welcome Iranian President Ahmadinejad in Baku in May, the second such
meeting in Azerbaijan after the two countries signed a non aggression
pact last year.

According to Sabina Freizer, if the US wants to ensure Azerbaijan’s
long-term support of its policies towards Iran, and overall regional
security, its best bet is to first focus on securing a peaceful
resolution of the existing Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. While the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict remains unresolved, Azerbaijan can ill
afford to undermine its improving relations with Tehran. At the same
time, if Azerbaijan makes good on its threat to take military action
against Nagorno-Karabakh, close to Iran’s northern borders, it will
undermine U.S. energy and security interests and cause the flight
of foreign investment from Azerbaijan. The volatile South Caucasus
region, plagued also by unresolved conflicts in Georgia, risks being
completely destabilized, dragging into the fight neighboring Russia,
Turkey and Iran. This perilous scenario is worth talking to Aliyev
about as much as the threats of a nuclear Iran.