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Baku: Baku-Tehran Tension Useful For Elites On Both Sides

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  • Baku: Baku-Tehran Tension Useful For Elites On Both Sides

    BAKU-TEHRAN TENSION USEFUL FOR ELITES ON BOTH SIDES

    AzeriReport
    http://azerireport.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=3666&Ite mid=48
    July 31 2012
    Azerbaijan

    There is a tendency to view the tense relationship between Azerbaijan
    and Iran through the prism of religion. But bilateral enmity is rooted
    more in strategic considerations than it is in ideology or religion.

    The emergence of an independent Azerbaijan after the 1991 Soviet
    collapse was always going to be a challenge for Iran, given that
    it revived old fears about separatism among Iran's large Azeri
    population. Over the years Iranian national sensitivities have been
    heightened by calls coming from some nationalist circles in Azerbaijan
    for reunification with predominantly Azeri lands in Iran, as well
    as by Baku's tendency to accentuate all things Turkish, often at the
    expense of the country's Iranian cultural heritage.

    >From an Iranian perspective, Tehran early on tried to make the best
    of a difficult situation - recognizing, for example, the Republic
    of Azerbaijan, despite the fact that there were two provinces with
    the identical name in Iran. For comparison, Greece still refuses to
    recognize the name of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia.

    To this day, Iranian leaders are miffed by what they see as a lack
    of Azerbaijani reciprocity for Tehran's recognition gesture, along
    other relatively magnanimous actions. Iranian perceptions of Baku's
    lingering hostility have helped push Tehran to build broad ties to
    Christian Armenia, the bitter rival of Azerbaijan.

    Pipeline politics in the 1990s also played a major role in fostering
    Azerbaijani-Iranian tension. Back when the energy-export derby
    was just getting started, many oilmen acknowledged that exporting
    Azerbaijani and Central Asian oil & gas via Iran made considerable
    economic sense. But the United States insisted that Iran be excluded
    from regional pipeline plans, and Baku, eager to win Washington's
    support for its own foreign policy objectives, not least its desire
    to recover Nagorno-Karabakh from Armenia, went along with the American
    demand. Tehran, naturally, was angered by Baku's willingness to accede
    to US wishes.

    These days, at a time when Iran is increasingly cornered by crippling
    economic sanctions imposed by the United States and European Union,
    along with Israeli threats to use all means necessary to end its
    nuclear program, Iranian leaders see Azerbaijan's close military
    cooperation with Israel as a threat. It has sought to counter
    this threat by mobilizing a network of radical Shiite Islamists
    in Azerbaijan.

    When it comes to its policy on Azerbaijan, Iran's strategic objective -
    to weaken the government of Ilham Aliyev - is in perfect alignment with
    the political agenda of the Islamic Republic's more hardline rulers,
    who are desperate to rekindle a sense of Islamic revolutionary fervor
    inside the country after three decades of authoritarian and corrupt
    theocratic rule.

    President Ilham Aliyev's administration, meanwhile, has its own
    concerns. Since the advent of the Arab Spring in 2011, officials in
    Baku have faced challenges not only from Islamists inside the country,
    but also from local Twitterati.

    In this context, Azerbaijan's strong stance toward Iran can be seen
    as a hedge against an explosion of domestic discontent. The Iranian
    nuclear crisis in particular has enabled Baku to cast itself as a
    potentially important Western ally and has helped it build strong
    relationships with the United States and EU. Azerbaijani leaders have
    made it clear that, as a strategic partner, it expects Washington and
    Brussels to turn a blind eye to Baku's bleak human rights record,
    and give authorities a free hand to do what they deem necessary in
    order to maintain the status quo.

    For the most part, Washington and Brussels have complied, offering
    only muted criticism of Azerbaijan's lack of progress toward
    democratization. But there have been exceptions, and these have
    prompted shrill responses by Baku. For example, bilateral relations
    between Azerbaijan and Germany took a nosedive after German officials
    and news media severely criticized Azerbaijani rights practices,
    and Baku responded with vitriolic statements aimed at Berlin.

    Azerbaijani officials also reacted with anger and disbelief, when
    the European Parliament adopted at the end of May 2012 a scathingly
    critical resolution on human rights conditions in Azerbaijan. Top
    presidential aides, including Novruz Mammadov and Ali Hasanov,
    insinuated, bizarrely, that Europe plotted together with Iran to
    undermine Azerbaijan's "independent foreign policy."

    Relations between Baku and Tehran will likely remain strained as long
    as both leaderships feel the benefits of escalating tensions outweigh
    the costs. Ideology, religion and nationalism certainly play a role in
    the bilateral drama, but none of these factors explains why tension
    is approaching an alarming point now. Iran's Islamism per se isn't a
    problem for Azerbaijan, nor is Baku's secularism a problem for the
    Islamic Republic. After all, Azerbaijan enjoys cordial relations
    with such countries as Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, while Iran tries
    to prop up the secular regime of Bashar Assad, at war with Muslim
    fundamentalists, albeit of a Sunni persuasion.

    It is mainly the survival strategies of the ruling elites in both
    countries that are causing friction. This is especially true in the
    case of Azerbaijan, since Iran provides for a perfect enemy against
    which to rally both domestic and international support. For Iran,
    Azerbaijan is not the main concern among its neighbors: Saudi Arabia
    and United Arab Emirates are. But occasionally lashing out at another
    "Western stooge" serves the interests of the ruling clique in Tehran
    just fine.

    * Eldar Mamedov is a political adviser to the Socialists & Democrats
    Group in the European Parliament, who writes in his personal capacity.

    This article was first published by Eurasianet.org.



    From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
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