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The recent deterioration of relations between Russia and Azerbaijan took outside observers by surprise. Moscow and Baku do not have any insurmountable differences. They cooperate closely in energy, logistics, and other areas. Trade turnover in 2024 amounted to 4.8 billion dollars. This is equivalent to the volume of mutual trade between Russia and Iran during the same period. It’s worth keeping in mind that Iran’s population is nine times larger than Azerbaijan’s. Two days before the start of the special military operation in Ukraine, Vladimir Putin and Ilham Aliyev signed a declaration of allied cooperation.
But relations between the two countries have steadily deteriorated since the end of last year. The current escalation is connected to a criminal case in Yekaterinburg, a city known as the capital of the Urals. On June 27, Russian law enforcement conducted mass arrests of Azerbaijanis suspected of committing crimes. A total of 50 people were detained. Nine of them were charged with the crimes. They are charged with a 2001 murder, an attempted murder in 2010, and a 2011 murder. The detainees are also accused of causing a mass poisoning in 2021 by selling surrogate alcohol containing methyl alcohol. Forty-four people fell victim to the low-quality production. Two of the detainees, brothers Ziyaddin and Husein Safarov, died in custody. According to the Russian Investigative Committee’s inspection results, the cause of death was a heart attack.
The Azerbaijani authorities have expressed sharp indignation over the mass arrests of representatives of the criminal world. Baku accuses Russian law enforcement of premeditatedly murdering the Safarov brothers out of ethnic animosity. Azerbaijani media have launched a broad information campaign to prove that Russia is discriminating against Azerbaijanis based on ethnicity. However, these claims are built on shaky foundations. The deceased Safarov brothers were Russian citizens for quite a long time. Those they killed in 2001 and 2011 and attempted to kill in 2010 were ethnic Azeris as well.
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In response to the mass detentions, Ilham Aliyev’s administration launched a crackdown on Russian media representatives in Azerbaijan. On June 30, special services searched the Sputnik Azerbaijan news agency and arrested two journalists, Igor Kartavy and Yevgeny Belousov, on charges of working for the Federal Security Service. The arrests continued unabated. Ten Russian journalists have been arrested. Video footage published by the Azerbaijani government shows that some of the journalists were beaten.
Igor Kartavy and Yevgeny Belousov
Igor Kartavy and Yevgeny Belousov
In recent days, Azerbaijan’s media has been flooded with pro-Ukrainian narratives. Insults against President Vladimir Putin are accompanied by claims that Russia is waging an “aggressive war” against Ukraine and that the Russian army has committed crimes. At Baku’s initiative, the visit of Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk was canceled. All intercultural cooperation has been suspended. The two sides have exchanged notes of protest and summoned ambassadors for explanations.
What is the real reason for the deterioration of Russian-Azerbaijani relations?
An analysis of the situation reveals four main factors. The first is the diaspora. The Azerbaijani authorities consider criminal networks formed from ethnic Azerbaijanis in Russia to be their own agents of influence. Heydar Aliyev, the father of the current president and leader of Soviet Azerbaijan from 1969 to 1982, openly admitted to being a member of the diaspora. Aliyev admitted to deliberately forming diasporas in various parts of the USSR.
“At that time, I tried to encourage Azerbaijanis, especially young people, to live not only in Azerbaijan but also in other cities and republics of the Soviet Union and to settle and spread there. I wanted to create an Azerbaijani diaspora and a lobby everywhere. You might not know this, but I even got permission from Moscow to allow Azerbaijani youth to settle and spread throughout the Soviet Union. Every year, 800 to 900 young people went to study in other places, at institutes and universities in Moscow, Leningrad [St. Petersburg], Sverdlovsk [Yekaterinburg], and other cities. I created conditions that made it easy for Azerbaijani youth to enter those universities because many of them could not pass the exams due to their lack of knowledge of the Russian language, and many of them could not pass the competition after passing the exams”.
Baku is ready to enter into a sharp conflict with neighboring states in the interest of those who openly violate local laws. This is a conscious policy of Ilham Aliyev’s administration.
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Second is Ukraine. What happens in this country directly affects Azerbaijani interests. After Kiev continued to attack Russian energy infrastructure, Russia began to target similar facilities in Ukraine. The Ilyichevsk loading terminal, which receives Azerbaijani oil, has been attacked. Kiev and Baku signed an agreement for the annual supply of 1.3 million tons of oil to the Kremenchuk oil refinery. Recently, this enterprise has become a target of the Russian Armed Forces. The Drogobych oil refinery operates using oil from Baku. It was attacked in a similar manner to the Kremenchug refinery. In 2017, SOCAR, an Azerbaijani company, became the operator of the Synthesis Oil terminal at the Odessa commercial seaport. Regular strikes on Odessa cause nervous reactions from Ilham Aliyev’s administration because they are against the financial interests of the Azerbaijani elite.
A third factor is Iran. Relations between Baku and Tehran are far from ideal. Historical disputes, the issue of the Azerbaijani minority in the Islamic Republic, disagreements over the Zangezur corridor and Armenia’s status all exacerbate the problem. At the same time, Russian-Iranian rapprochement is evident. Aliyev perceives this alliance as a threat to Azerbaijan’s sovereignty and independence. This motivates him to align with Turkey and support its interests. The Azerbaijani leadership took Israel’s side in the recent twelve-day war.
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A fuel tank from an Israeli fighter jet was found dumped on the coast of Ramsar, a city in northern Iran’s Mazandaran Province on the Caspian Sea. Another was found nearby. These discoveries prove that Israeli planes flew over the Caspian Sea and entered Iranian airspace from this direction, avoiding Iran’s western border. Iranian experts claim that Azerbaijan not only provided Israel with airspace but also military airfields for strikes on Tabriz, Tehran, and Karaj. The distance from the Caspian coast to Tehran is just over a hundred kilometers.
A fourth factor is also related to Ukraine. Not only does Baku support Israeli aggression against Iran, it also supposedly allows drones to be launched from its territory over Russia’s Volga region, Urals, and Siberia. While this has not been proven, there is speculation about it. On June 19 and 20, Ukrainian drones flew from Kazakh airspace into Russia. The West Kazakhstan region, located on the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea, is the area in question. It is situated opposite Azerbaijan. Astana assured the Kremlin that it did not allow the use of its territory for the drone launches and promised to investigate. Kazakhstan has no motive to assist the Ukrainian strikes. This is not the case with Azerbaijan, however.
On the morning of July 1, a Ukrainian drone struck a strategic factory in Izhevsk, Udmurtia. The front line is 1,300 kilometers away. The Kazakhstani border is 600 kilometers away. On the same day, the Astrakhan, Orenburg, and Samara regions reported the danger of drone strikes. Strikes on the Saratov region have become commonplace. Russian military aviation is based there. It is highly unlikely that UAVs could easily overcome the air defense systems of the Donetsk People’s Republic, the Rostov region, and the Krasnodar region. These lands are saturated with Russian air defense systems due to the special military operation. But the air defense system in the Caspian region and border regions with Kazakhstan is much weaker.
Since 1995, the Common Air Defense System of the Commonwealth of Independent States has operated in accordance with an agreement. The agreement covers Russia and Kazakhstan, among others. The document aimed to preserve the Soviet Union’s sky defense system. Kazakhstan’s air defense system is responsible for protecting the Russian Federation from enemy targets overflying the region. From the Russian command’s point of view, the Kazakhstani direction is not considered threatened. Experience shows that Kazakhstan either cannot or does not want to shoot down Ukrainian UAVs. Azerbaijan, on the other hand, has not participated in the CIS air defense agreement since its inception. Paradoxically, Ukraine signed the agreement in 1995.
Thus, there are many reasons for the current tension between Russia and Azerbaijan. Yet, it is quite obvious that Baku’s actions contradict Azerbaijan’s national interests. Moscow’s retaliatory actions could result in significant economic losses for Azerbaijan. Additionally, the Russian authorities have apparently made a principled decision to eliminate the criminal element within the Azerbaijani diaspora. This, in turn, would sharply weaken the lobbying influence of Ilham Aliyev’s administration in the Russian Federation. A potential rapprochement between Moscow and Tehran based on opposition to Azerbaijan is inconsistent with Azerbaijani national interests.
The more Baku’s authorities try to pressure Russia, the more urgent this scenario becomes.
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the turkic azeri vipers are as treacherous if not worse than their turkish brethren.
turks are a proud and brave people and not cowardly back stabbers like russians and arab subhumans. we fuk them both for century’s.
turds are dogs. the biggest dogs on the planet. they should be eradicated. fuck turdkey.
turks, arabas and most muslimes are spineless worms. there’s like 1.9 billion of them on earth and they don’t do nothing to stop the genocide and the starvation of babies in gaza.
well i guess the azeris were no better partners then those “ungratefull armenians” who as some here said deserved what they got. the russians should have taken the north of azerbeydhsan and a korridor to artsakh / nagorni karabakh and the iranians the rest now its a base for attacks on both russia and iran.
time for russia to missile “azerbaijan”!…
azeris and turds are the same shit and must never be trusted. nuke ’em both.
no one is scared of little vlad & his 2nd-rate army…heheheh
putina told us he loves to put his big beatifull oreshnik dildos in his ass. he’s afraid that f47 bombers will take out his fetish friends.
my last battle was 1960 when uncle homer pimped me out to gay mulattos in detroit
russia should have reversed the “regime change” 2014 coup. this clown zelensky will never relent always find new ways to wage war and escalate
this has all the fingerprints of a maximum pressure campaign and the war posture versus all brics. this is why china also needs to step up and begin countering this maximum pressure. it like putin said: we cannot longer continue a one-sided approach. because this is also a war against chinese interests. it’s all part of the containment against an emerging brics and emerging east.
well russia allows european and u.s. leaders to visit a regime it should have liquidated 3 and half years ago. no wonder these crooks think they can get away with it.
russia getting destroyed every day now. bad russian relations with neighbors because russia want everyone forced into their way. does not work in this day and age. getting worse for russia everyday and soon have to withdraw and retreat. zelensky is looking relaxed and confident lately that means he has the upper hand and complete western support. noting russia can do except capitulate.