AZG Armenian Daily #044, 11/03/2006
Interview
THE LUXURY AND HOLLOWNESS OF AZERI OIL
Mayis Gyulaliev: Oil shipment is not in Azerbaijan’s interests
Beginning in previous issue
– But Aliyev talks of military solution.
– Armenia and Azerbaijan are too small to settle this
issue on their own, and the West currently pursues the
following goals: stability, therefore it needs now
neither war nor regulation and also it needs secure
balanced development of three national economies. This
means that even if Azerbaijan produces 50 million
tones of oil annually its economy will never surpass
those of Armenia and Georgia because the necessary
balance will be upset in that case. It is not playing
into the West’s hands. It strives to keep the Karabakh
issue unresolved in order to keep the republics under
its control. In my opinion, the aim of Aliyev’s
statements is to upset the balance between Azerbaijan
and other states, including Russia, Kazakhstan,
Georgia, Iran and even the USA and the West as a
whole.
– Do others agree with this opinion of yours?
– Regrettably, no. Only 2-3 non-parliamentary parties
do but no NGO. In general there are two approaches to
this issue in the society: governmental – peaceful
settlement and radically oppositional – military
settlement, which I think will bring no solution and
is just a means to keep the people in fear. Those two
approaches oppose the interests of the Azerbaijani
people and the Caucasus as a whole because it has only
one way of development – integration of three South
Caucasus states.
– Is that possible that the West’s stance as you
portrayed it will change at some point in time?
– Only when Azerbaijan will run out of oil.
– But Azerbaijan has a purely economic interest; now
is it better to go on with or without the pipeline?
– When I speak of damaging influence of oil agreements
on politics I mean the economic aspect; we did not
need to expand oil production and we should direct the
oil money to other spheres especially educational and
expect revenue in 10 or 15 years. But today only the
oil production is developing and other branches do not
and will not develop. All structures are serving oil
production.
– What has changed after Rambouillet? Why have accents
shifted?
– Before the Rambouillet I said and wrote that the
Karabakh issue will not be settled before 2025. More
precisely, before Azerbaijan runs out of oil as the
threat of war first of all endangers Western projects.
There is also a threat that Armenia and Azerbaijan may
make friends and settle the issue on their own –
something that goes against Western plans.
– How you personally see the regulation? (answering
this question the civilized Azeri displayed his true
Azeri nature)
– If we begin with useless historic questions such as
to whom this land belongs, then let us begin with
Darwin’s theory… There are two options: Karabakh
remains within Azerbaijan and solves all its problems,
Karabakh gets out of Azerbaijan’s structure and unites
with Armenia. If Azerbaijan does not give up the first
option and Armenia the second one trying jointly to
find the third option then our states cannot develop.
– Which is the third one?
– I do not have the recipe either. But I believe that
the Armenian and Azeri societies can recuperate. We
need to get rid of historic hostility toward each
other.
By Marietta Khachatrian