Azeri Press Agency, Azerbaijan
June 23 2006

President Ilham Aliyev: Azerbaijan needs to change its policy as
Armenia shows incompliance with international norms

[ 23 Jun. 2006 15:48 ]

Graduation ceremony was held at Azerbaijan’s Higher Military School
named after Heydar Aliyev on the occasion of graduation from the Armed
Forces educational institutions and Medical University’s military
medicine faculty (APA).

Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev also attended the graduation
ceremony. Addressing the ceremony, the head of state said the state
is taking much care of army institution in Azerbaijan noting that
military budget was raised for four times in the past three months.

The President stressed that the military budget was $135 million in
2003 and reached nearly $700 million in 2006.

"The salaries of military men increased three times in the past three
months. We know well from the history that a strong army means a
strong state," Mr.Aliyev said.

Touching on the Nagorno Garabagh conflict, the Supreme
Commander-in-Chief regretted for fruitless result so far.

"The world is ruled in accordance with certain rules. The influential
organizations such as the UN, Council of Europe, GUAM, Organization
of the Islamic Conference, Organization of Economic Development have
stated their positions and adopted fair decisions regarding this
issue. However, Armenia ignores the positions of the international
organizations. The territorial integrity of Azerbaijan cannot
be the topic of the negotiations. We welcome the efforts of the
international organizations regarding the continuation of the
negotiating process. However, out patience is not endless. Armenian
does not comply with international norms, in this case, Azerbaijan
has to make changes to its policy. How long will the negotiating
process last and how long shall we wait?

Armenia cannot be a rival to us and it is a reality that we are
more powerful. As far as we know, they find it difficult to protect
the contact front line due to lack of forces while Azerbaijan is
developing speedily in all spheres and becoming powerful day by day,"
President Aliyev noted.

The President also said the state budget has reached $5 billion and
total budget is much higher. The head of state stressed that the Gross
Domestic Product increased by 26% and by 40% in the past five months,
400,000 new work places have been opened, more than 300 schools were
built and several other important measures were implemented./APA/
From: Baghdasarian