As reported by Independent Military Observer Russian newspaper on November 19, over 50 NATO servicemen, mostly Americans, were quartered in the village of Chukhanly of the Salyani region of Azerbaijan in a training center belonging to Azeri the Defense Ministry. According to the newspaper, beginning with the next year, the US military are going to implement in Azerbaijan a program analogous to the one carried out in Georgia. Member of the Azerbaijani Defense Ministry press service Ilgar Verdiyev confirmed the information to the journalists, stating, however, that the foreign servicemen are arriving in Azerbaijan only for the participation in concrete projects aimed at Partnership for Peace NATO program realization.
Yet head of the press service Ramiz Melikov completely refuted the information and said that he does not possess any data of the US instructors who are allegedly to train Azeri soldiers. At the same time Azeri Foreign Ministry Deputy Araz Azimov does not rule out the possibility of stationing US mobile forces in Azerbaijan. Former high rank official of the Azeri Defense Ministry Uzeir Jafarov holds the opinion that the Azerbaijan-NATO cooperation long ago exceeded the limits of Partnership for Peace program. In Jafarov’s words, the program similar to the Georgian one is in active preparation in Azerbaijan at present and will to all appearances be launched in 2005. However Azerbaijani FM Elmar Mamedyarov stated that “Azerbaijan is not negotiating on dislocating foreign military bases in its territory”. “A military base is a stationary object that cannot be deployed during one night. Multi-stage negotiations are needed for it”, the Minister noted. As expert of the East-West Center of Political Research Azer Rashidoglu told the newspaper reporter, the EU is expected to unanimously speak against the US anti-Iranian operation. (The complete version of the article read at http://nvo.ng.ru/wars/2004-11-19/2_usa.html).
To remind, the hearsay on using the Azeri territories for probable US military operations against Iran revived recently. As for stationary military bases in Azerbaijan, according the Pentagon new military doctrine on mobile bases, there will be no need in them. Thus, nominally, military bases in their classical meaning might not exist.
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