According to our source in Washington, “Azerbaijan and the Euroatlantic Community” presentation was organized by Azeri MPs Samad Seyidov and Asim Mollazade via the Azeri Embassy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) last week. The briefing was organized, which bought lunch for participants. Representatives of the Presidential Administration including Presidential Administration ‘ideology’ and foreign relations chiefs Ali Hassanov and Novruz Mammadov as well as former Ambassador to Azerbaijan Richard Kauzlarich participated in the briefing. The presentation had a two-prong goal: paint Azerbaijan as a pro-Western state and, in terms of the Karabakh conflict, a peaceful state merely seeking a discussion of the Karabakh conflict in an “open way”. To remind, both, Seyidov and Mollazade represent Azerbaijan in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). The organizers expressed the opinion that Azerbaijan is the only “independent country in that region: Georgia is weak – Azerbaijan “is helping it to become more democratic,” Iran is dangerous, while Armenia depends on Russian military assistance”. Mollazade stressed that a new war was not an option for Azerbaijan since that would jeopardize oil development.
Richard Kauzlarich recalled that while conducting a USIP project in Azerbaijan in 2002 all he heard was calls for war but added “may be that’s the case in Armenia too.” Seyidov blamed refugees, “who were pushing them”.
Eldar Salayev of Azeri exile Rasul Guliyev’s Democratic Party suggested that democratic conditions were getting worse in Azerbaijan and asked how in the world Azerbaijan could teach Georgians democracy. Mollazade responded that he was helping by convincing Georgian Azeris that Saakashvili was not Armenian and that they should vote for him.
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