Baku, Azerbaijan, Sept. 19
By Elmira Tariverdiyeva – Trend:
The relationship of a part of Armenians, which includes both the Armenian diaspora in the US and official Yerevan, with the new US administration can be described as unrequited love, transformed into uncontrolled jealousy.
The fact that US President Donald Trump initially had a cold attitude towards the Armenian lobby and Armenia in general, was obvious from the very beginning. Considering this, the relationship of the US with Azerbaijan causes idiosyncrasic reaction from Armenia.
Trump has always looked indifferently at the financial flows from the Armenian diaspora, aimed to lobby Armenia’s interests, which flow into the pockets of the US congressmen and senators. Trump, a successful businessman who, without attracting third-party investment, financed his election campaign, turned out to be frighteningly independent.
He owes nothing to anyone, the Armenian diaspora has absolutely no influence on him, and Armenia doesn’t like the fact that this tendency is only growing with each of his new actions.
An even more frightening fact is that Trump’s independence from political interest groups in the US may help him soberly approach the issues of the South Caucasus region, relying on national interests of the US, not the interests of the Armenian lobby.
The importance of Azerbaijan for the US is not due to any administration’s personal attitude towards Baku, but due to the strategic and geographical position of the country, bordering Russia and Iran, which is also one of the biggest oil and gas producers and has the highest level of religious tolerance. So, if the US president is really independent, he will maintain relations with Baku at the highest level, relying on his country’s national interests.
This means that Trump will primarily pay attention to relations with Azerbaijan and Georgia in the region.
It is no coincidence that at the 6th Armenia-Diaspora forum, which is currently underway in Yerevan, many members of the Armenian lobby of the US were openly complaining about Trump’s disliking them.
Raffi Balian, a representative of the Armenian diaspora of the US, said he strongly doubts that US President Donald Trump will recognize the “Armenian genocide,” news.am, the Armenian news agency, reported.
He said that Trump is not reliable in this matter.
“This person has considerable economic, financial ties with Turkey and Azerbaijan,” Balian added.
However, what Balian meant by “financial ties” is unclear.
Perhaps, he meant a completed construction project in Azerbaijan, once implemented by a company, which belongs to Trump. However, one can feel that Armenians are jealous over the new US administration’s relations with Baku.
Armenians started to feel especially uncomfortable after the US chose Azerbaijan to hold a historic meeting on February 16, 2017 between General Joseph Francis Dunford, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, and General Valery Gerasimov, chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces.
Thus, Washington unambiguously identified who is trusted in the region. Today, Azerbaijan and the US, right in front of jealous Armenia, continue to build equal partnership relations based on respecting national interests of each other.
This is while Armenia and the Armenian lobby of the US are still trying to find ugly details in these relations, although one can forgive them, because jealousy is capable of causing even greater distortions of reality.