Comments on: Azerbaijan: The pipeline that would fuel a dictator http://www.redpepper.org.uk/azerbaijan-the-pipeline-that-would-fuel-a-dictator/ Red Pepper Tue, 17 Sep 2013 17:58:53 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.6.1 By: Emma Hughes http://www.redpepper.org.uk/azerbaijan-the-pipeline-that-would-fuel-a-dictator/#comment-229646 Emma Hughes Tue, 17 Sep 2013 11:23:04 +0000 http://www.redpepper.org.uk/?p=11266#comment-229646 Hello Robert,

Thanks for your comments – you’re completely right about Aliyev playing up nationalist tensions as another strategy of control – and yes Azerbaijani citizens are questioning this more – in particular during the protests about the non-combat deaths of soldiers. I’m afraid I had to leave it out in this article due to space constraints (the focus of the article was of course on energy). See this article: http://www.platformlondon.org/TEAS for comments on the double standards of The European Azerbaijan Society in relation to IDPs from Nagorno-Karabakh

cheers
emma

]]> By: Robert http://www.redpepper.org.uk/azerbaijan-the-pipeline-that-would-fuel-a-dictator/#comment-229539 Robert Mon, 16 Sep 2013 19:36:46 +0000 http://www.redpepper.org.uk/?p=11266#comment-229539 Great article – although it didn’t mention the 500-phound gorilla in the (already crowded) room. Money is one part of Aliyev’s regime’s strategy to keep the situation the way it is – under their full control. Another vital part is the image of “evil Armenians” who “occupy 20% of the historic Azeri land” – they have been using for 20 years to distract the national attention from the real problems the country is facing. Indeed, every possible setback for the country – from wildfires to Western criticism – is blamed on Armenians. The regime is doing everything possible to keep the tensions high, to prevent any possible contacts by torpedoing even the most innocuous projects initiated by mediators or even their own people (imagine this: anybody regardless of their citizenship is barred from entering Azerbaijan is his/her last name resembles Armenian heritage).

Fortunately, some Azeris seem to be getting much more skeptical about the “Armenian straw man” – turning to legitimate questions about the corruption and the lack of basic democratic mechanisms in the country.

The fact that the Author decided not to mention this openly fascist state policy of the Aliyev regime is probably an attempt to not to appear biased – although I think it has to be mentioned to present the whole picture of the current Aliyev regime.

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