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AZERBAIJAN TO DOUBLE MILITARY SPENDING
PRESS TV
April 15 2008
Iran
Azerbaijan will double military spending this year as it continues
an arms build-up amid tensions with Armenia-backed separatists.
President Ilham Aliyev said at a cabinet meeting late Monday that he
wanted to raise the military's budget to nearly two billion dollars
in 2008, the official daily newspaper Azerbaijan reported on Tuesday.
That sum amounted to a revision after he earlier announced a 30
percent rise from one billion dollars to 1.3 billion dollars.
"We cannot forget that we are at war," the daily quoted Aliyev as
saying, referring to the conflict over the ethnic Armenian enclave
of Nagorny Karabakh.
"I believe we must increase military spending despite the fact that
1.3 billion dollars is a large sum.... Military spending this year
must be nearer to two billion dollars," he said.
Azerbaijan's economy has surged thanks to soaring oil revenues and
the country had already more than quadrupled its military budget
since 2004 by last year.
Aliyev has vowed to use "all means" to restore Azerbaijani control
over Nagorny Karabakh.
Backed by Armenia, ethnic Armenian forces took control of Nagorny
Karabakh during a war in the early 1990s that killed thousands and
forced nearly a million people on both sides to flee their homes.
A ceasefire was signed in 1994 but the dispute remains unresolved
after more than a decade of negotiations. Troops remain in a tense
stand-off and shootings are common.
PRESS TV
April 15 2008
Iran
Azerbaijan will double military spending this year as it continues
an arms build-up amid tensions with Armenia-backed separatists.
President Ilham Aliyev said at a cabinet meeting late Monday that he
wanted to raise the military's budget to nearly two billion dollars
in 2008, the official daily newspaper Azerbaijan reported on Tuesday.
That sum amounted to a revision after he earlier announced a 30
percent rise from one billion dollars to 1.3 billion dollars.
"We cannot forget that we are at war," the daily quoted Aliyev as
saying, referring to the conflict over the ethnic Armenian enclave
of Nagorny Karabakh.
"I believe we must increase military spending despite the fact that
1.3 billion dollars is a large sum.... Military spending this year
must be nearer to two billion dollars," he said.
Azerbaijan's economy has surged thanks to soaring oil revenues and
the country had already more than quadrupled its military budget
since 2004 by last year.
Aliyev has vowed to use "all means" to restore Azerbaijani control
over Nagorny Karabakh.
Backed by Armenia, ethnic Armenian forces took control of Nagorny
Karabakh during a war in the early 1990s that killed thousands and
forced nearly a million people on both sides to flee their homes.
A ceasefire was signed in 1994 but the dispute remains unresolved
after more than a decade of negotiations. Troops remain in a tense
stand-off and shootings are common.