What is behind the attack on USAID?

Baku/22.11.23/Turan: Further work of USAID in Azerbaijan is impossible – such a conclusion can be drawn from the propaganda hype raised by the pro-government media and a number of officials of the country.

The attack on USAID began immediately after the detention of the leaders of the online publication Abzas Media, who were allegedly funded by this American organization.

However, a "sincere" outburst of indignation broke out after the news that USAID had allocated $4 million to Armenian refugees from Karabakh.

The tweet of USAID head Samantha Power that these people left Karabakh as a result of Azerbaijan's military operation was perceived by official Baku almost as a violation of the country's sovereignty.
Hikmet Hajiyev, the usually calm assistant to the head of state for foreign policy, burst into an angry long tirade against Samantha Power. He accused her of friendship with the former "state minister" of Karabakh Ruben Vardanyan and complicity in the Aurora program.

"Azerbaijanophobia, Turkophobia, political corruption and political speculation were probably the common values and interests of Ruben Vardanyan and Samantha Power," the assistant to the President of Azerbaijan believes.

Hajiyev was not too lazy to mention Power's book "The Problem from Hell: America and the Era of Genocide", where she "completely kept silent about the genocide and atrocities of Armenia against Azerbaijanis."

During 30 years of occupation of Azerbaijani lands by Armenians and ethnic cleansing, the United States sided with the aggressor - Armenia. "Today, the same policy continues in the same form and manifestation," Hajiyev writes, accusing Power that as the US representative to the UN Security Council, she never raised the issue of the plight of Azerbaijani refugees and internally displaced persons and did not demand the implementation of UN Security Council resolutions.

"Masks are removed! There is no more place for USAID activities in Azerbaijan!", - Hikmet Hajiyev, (by the way, a graduate of the American George Marshall Center, the NATO Defense College and the Belgian University ULB), passes his sentence.

Apparently, official Baku cannot forgive Washington for the congressional hearings on November 15 and the accusations made there against the Azerbaijani authorities. And the statement of Assistant Secretary of State O'Brien that from now on relations between Washington and Baku cannot be the same is perceived in Baku as a personal insult.

It can be assumed that in the near future the campaign of criticism against the United States will continue, and new "evidence" of interference in the internal affairs of Azerbaijan in the form of funding of critical media and the opposition will be presented.

We can also expect new arrests of public activists and individual journalists. -02B-