Iran- Azerbaijani Relations in 2013: decrease in trade, border
clashes, “cultural wars”
20:38 28/12/2013 » Interviews
During 2013 serious disagreements took place between Iran and
Azerbaijan on different dimensions, including cultural, political,
legal etc. Panorama.am conducted an interview with an expert on
Iranian Studies, Armen Israelyan:
What kind of developments occurred in Iran-Azerbaijani relations in
recent years?
-If we try to evaluate Iran-Azerbaijani relations during last 3 years,
we can conclude that year by year the atmosphere of distrust present
in mutual relations has deepened, meanwhile generating new issues and
problems.
If from 2010 to 2011 the Azerbaijani authorities pursued anti-Iran
policies indirectly, through the help of Media or other groupings,
starting from 2012 to 2013 they didn’t even try to hide it and started
to conduct the policy through high rank officials.
Why the relations deteriorated?
-The main reasons for emerging tensions in Iran-Azerbaijani relations
are the following:
Azerbaijan’s manipulation of issues concerning Turkic speaking Iranians.
Azerbaijan raises claims on some territories of Northern Iran
There are unsubstantional detentions of Iranian citizens in Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan launched a process of declaring Iranian cultural heritage its own
Restrictions on Iranian representatives acting in Azerbaijan
Israel-Azerbaijan strategic relations
Armed clashes on border
Azerbaijan carries out unsubstantional detentions of Iranian citizens
in Azerbaijan
Legal status of Caspian Sea: Ecological issues
It’s well known that Azerbaijan -Iran relations were at the highest
point of escalation during the period when Ahmedinjad was the
president of Iran. What’s Hassan Rouhani’s approach?
-If we try to evaluate the level of Azerbaijan-Iran relations during
2013, it can be claimed that in comparison to the last two years, this
year as well hasn’t provided any positive shifts in the relations.
Complete the opposite; there are spheres in which we can witness an
escalation.
Newly elected president of Islamic Republic of Iran during the
pre-election campaign declared that Azerbaijan became a security
threat for Iran. In June of 2013 IRI Majlis Research Center published
a report about Azerbaijan- Iran relations. According to the report in
recent years Azerbaijan launched pan-Azeri ideology, the basis of
which is the ideology of Turk-Azeri nationality which, on its turn, is
presented as a part of Azerbaijani national identity. To create
national unity Azerbaijan established an ideology of creating Greater
Azerbaijan, which includes the territories of Iran where
Azeri-speaking people live.
The authors of the report state that Israel -Azerbaijan economic,
political as well as cultural ties are considered to be a serious
warning for Iran.
Hassan Rouhani when already elected as a president declared that Iran
would try to establish friendly relations with all its neighbors
including Azerbaijan. Indeed, during first months in office, Rouhani
with the help of Iran’s ambassador to Azerbaijan was making attempts
to resolve disagreements with Azerbaijan. However, despite Iran’s
efforts official Baku not only continued to pursue anti-Iran policy
but also made certain steps which further escalated the situation
What role do Israel and Turkey play in Iran -Azerbaijan relations?
-The main supporters of Azerbaijani anti-Iran policy are Turkey and
Israel: The latter, based on their political interests, have been
trying to reduce Iran’s influence in Azerbaijan. Under these
circumstances, Azerbaijani authorities starting from 2011 expelled
from Baku 8 representatives of Islamic Republic of Iran, including the
representative of Spiritual head of Iran, people working in Iranian
telecommunication and cultural centers.
Speaking about so called Iran’s ethnic problems, it can be stated that
recently Turkey together with Azerbaijan using Media, separatist
groups and many other means openly pursued separatist policies in
Iran. They never missed an opportunity to manipulate the issue of
Turkic-speaking Iranians to put forward territorial claims to the
Eastern and Western Atrpatakan states of Iran, calling these states
`Southern Azerbaijan’.
It’s not a secret that one of Turkey’s long-term goals is to become
united with Azerbaijan through the Turkic- speaking Northern states of
Iran. As recent events show the actions of Turkish-Azerbaijani
alliance is directed towards the above mentioned goal.
An agreement signed by Iran and `5+1′ and in that context the positive
developments in Iran-U.S relations contribute to the increasing role
of Iran in the region.
Naturally, Turkey and Azerbaijan should be jealous of the fact. It’s
obvious that under this conditions Turkey’s influence in the region
would decrease, while Azerbaijan would lose its importance for Israel.
– It is known that Iran and Azerbaijan have serious disagreements in
cultural sphere: What kinds of developments are recorded in 2013?
– In 2013 Azerbaijan was in a `cultural war’. In previous years
Azerbaijan had managed to prescribe one of Iranian literature classics
of the 12th century, Nazimi Gyanjavi, as well as the Iranian musical
instrument `tar’ to itself. This year it managed to prescribe the old,
Iranian game polo.
The Iranian side protested only when a month was left for the annual
meeting of UNESCO. Meanwhile, seeing that it is not possible to stop
the registration process by UNESCO Iran suggested the organization to
register the game as a common cultural heritage. The suggestion of
Iran was not supported.
The previous authorities of Iran were not consistent of the activities
of Azerbaijan in subscribing the Iranian culture to itself. The
present leadership is more persistent in that issue. In that
connection the Minister of Islamic culture and guidance Ali Jannati
has recently made a statement, noting that some short-minded people
try to eliminate the Iranian cultural heritage, the Persian language
and literature; they, however, will not rich their goal.
– The armed clashes on Iranian-Azerbaijani border have become more
frequent recently: What was the situation in 2013?
– Dozens of armed clashes have been recorded on Iranian-Azerbaijani
border during the last 3 years. It is known that drag transportation
from Afghanistan to Europe passes through Azerbaijan. The Azerbaijani
authorities, having direct participation in drag trafficking, make a
fuss of any incident that occurs on the Iranian – Azerbaijani border.
In this way the try to show as if they fight against the smugglers
relentless.
However, as the Border Guard Commander and IRI ambassador to
Azerbaijan claim, Azerbaijan does not cooperate with Iran in the fight
against the drag trafficking. According to the IRI ambassador there
are drag trafficking bands formed in Azerbaijan, the import of the
illegal drags to Caucasus is mainly controlled by those bands.
– Have the tensed relations influenced the economic ties?
– As I noted already, Azerbaijan does everything to limit the presence
of Iran as much as possible. Azerbaijan, under the pretext of the
shootings on the Nakhijevan border closed the Iranian border from one
side during the last year. This action was followed by Iran’s sharp
answer; Iran on its turn closed the checkpoints in Bilesavari and
Jolfai.
Though Iran has unilaterally abolished the visa regime for the
Azerbaijani citizens, Baku refuses to do the same for the Iranian
citizens.
About 12 years ago according to the agreement achieved by the two
countries the border-close citizens had the right to move from country
to country without visa regime, however, last year, Azerbaijan
abolished this agreement.
It has been a long time now that Iran suggests Azerbaijan to establish
small markets in the border-close territory; however this country does
not accept the offer.
Because of the above mentioned circumstance the trade turnover has
reduced during the last years reaching from 539 to 263 million
dollars.
– How will Iran-Azerbaijan relations develop? Are there intentions of
improvement?
– Analyzing the recent developments in Iranian – Azerbaijani relations
we can say definitely that there can hardly be any improvement in the
relations in the near future. This is related with both the bilateral
problems and the interests in Israel-Turkey relations.
The thing is that the role of Iran will grow in case of improvement of
Iran – U.S. relations.
Washington taking into consideration the Iran – Israeli, Iran – Turkey
contradictions tries to reduce its dependence from those countries by
the help of Tehran. In the same time it tries to use the issue of the
settlement of the relations with Iran for keeping those countries
under its control.
In that case the military strategic partners of Azerbaijan – Turkey
and Israel – by all means will try to hinder Iran’s attempt of
becoming superpower-country of the region.
http://www.panorama.am/en/politics/2013/12/28/a-israyelyan/