Azerbaijani Union - a new model for the consolidation of the Azerbaijani diaspora in the United States

Baku/21.05.21/Turan: In recent years, a number of Azerbaijani diaspora organizations have been created in the United States. Among them, the Azerbaijani Union attracts special attention, which, using the achievements of modern information technologies, was able to rally thousands of compatriots living in various states of the United States, as well as Canada, around the Platform for the Unity of Azerbaijanis. The organization's facebook group includes more than five thousand real members.

The members of the organization are representatives of various professions, specialties, persons with different political worldviews. The Azerbaijani Union actively showed itself during the days of the second Karabakh war with charitable campaigns in support of victims of military operations, as well as protest actions against the spread of disinformation about Azerbaijan in the United States. Our interlocutor is the president and co-founder Farhad Alekperzade.

Our reference: Farhad Alekperzade was born in 1989 in Baku. He graduated from Azerbaijan Technical University with a degree in Information Technologies. He was engaged in digital marketing. In 2016, he moved to the United States with his family. Owned and managed advertising agencies in Azerbaijan and the USA.

- How did the new idea of ​​creating the Azerbaijani Union appear?

The idea of ​​creating the Azerbaijani Union came to me at the end of 2016, when I searched the Internet for Azerbaijani communities in different states of America, when I just came to the city of Denver in Colorado. Not many Azerbaijanis live in this city and state. As you know, a large number of our compatriots live in New York, Houston - Texas, in Northern California - San Francisco. I wanted to learn what Azerbaijanis are doing in America.

Unfortunately, there was little information about the Azerbaijani communities. I was looking at Facebook pages that were not active, let alone no sites. Therefore, while in Denver, I had virtually no information about our communities in other states.

Where information was found, it made it possible to judge that the organizations were local in nature, operated at the level of a state or even a city.

When I looked at these organizations, I felt that there is no system to get acquainted with Azerbaijanis living in different states, talk, and help each other get a job, open a business. As you know, every idea comes up when you face a problem. Therefore, I got the idea to develop an online platform for Azerbaijanis, where everyone will gather and help each other. It subsequently developed into an organization. At first, it was created as a non-profit organization of the third category, that is, dealing with cultural issues. Now we have grown into the fourth category, for example, the Armenian organization ANCA (Armenian National Committee of America) is in this category, that is, we have moved to the level of a socio-political organization and are awaiting official approval. Organizations of this category have the right to meet with politicians, invite them to meetings, and demand something from them for their community.

Although the organization was registered in 2018 in California, its structural formation took place for two years and on April 18, 2020 it was officially announced the beginning of its activity as an organization uniting Azerbaijanis from the USA and Canada.

- Last year, your organization was quite active, especially during the 44-day Karabakh war ...

- Yes, we had shares. They were organized through activists from our local communities. The advantages of our platform are that we have collected more than 5 thousand Azerbaijanis who live in the United States and Canada. At the same time, individual groups of our members can organize events on their own initiative. Our activists, in particular, held a protest action during the Karabakh war in Atlanta in front of the CNN office because of the biased coverage of these events by the TV channel. The American media did not provide truthful information, covered the events in a distorted light, and were engaged in propaganda and dissemination of the position of the Armenian side.

In addition, an action was held in the central (capital) city of California in Sacramento against the fact that some state officials of this state, in particular in Los Angeles, spoke on the events in Karabakh from the position of Armenia.

- There was a lot of information on social networks about your organization's assistance to people who suffered during the war. How was the aid distributed?

- Immediately after the start of the war, Azerbaijanis in the United States began to collect funds. The campaign was initiated by a group from Chicago, together with which our organization and the Azerbaijan Cultural Society operating in Northern California organized a fundraiser.

During three campaigns, about 400 thousand dollars were collected. Part of the funds was received by the families of martyrs. They were given cards "Capital Bank" in the amount of 1,000 manats. On-site help was distributed by our teams. Since the official lists of martyrs during the period of hostilities were not announced, assistance was passed on to those families about which we had information. Some families also received household appliances, tablets for children, etc.

In a similar way, assistance was rendered to some war veterans, as well as to persons from among the victims of rocket attacks on Barda, Tartar and Ganja.

- In recent years, the number of Azerbaijanis moving to the United States for permanent residence, or people wishing to move, has been growing. What attracts people to America?

- People tend to America for various reasons. One of the most common is the desire to improve one's economic situation. Of course, America also has its own problems, especially during a pandemic.

However, in general, in the United States, there are more opportunities for people to find job in their profession, or to study another specialty. There are jobs here; professionals are constantly required. All this, of course, attracts people. The second is freedom of speech, other freedoms.

Many people, including from Azerbaijan, although most prefer not to declare this publicly, are dissatisfied with the things that are happening in their countries, I mean in this case the post-Soviet space.

For very smart, successful people who made good money in their country often come to America. I know the relocated heads of banks, large companies.

That is, the reason for the move was not economic difficulties. People had houses, apartments, summer cottages, businesses, good positions, salaries. However, they preferred to leave for the USA and have freedom here in every sense of the word, where you can easily open a business, do it, develop it and not be afraid of what might happen to his business. Many specialists, especially in the IT field, come to realize their potential, get high-paid positions, and launch startups.

- Do you know Azerbaijanis in the United States who have achieved success in politics, civil service, and business?

- Yes, many of our compatriots have made a successful career in the United States in business. Now they are represented in corporations such as Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, PayPal, OpenGov, Blue Cross, Linkedin, etc. They hold positions on the level of specialists and top specialists and even heads of departments.

Some of our compatriots have their own startups, which have come out profit, have millions in turnover.

There are, of course, businessmen in traditional spheres, such as buying and selling real estate and providing services. There is a successful company Aznut, which specializes in the production of nuts and hazelnuts.

It works in Florida. They have one of the Amazon sales channels and there their products rank first among the goods of this assortment according to the rating. “Azerbaijan” is written on the design of this product, photographs are shown, including of Karabakh.

That is, they are engaged in business, are successful in their field and at the same time do not forget to disseminate information about Azerbaijan.

- And what about the representation of Azerbaijanis in managerial positions in government agencies?

- In different states, at different times there were our compatriots. However, there were very few of them. Now, there are also Azerbaijanis in various state structures. However, they are at the level of specialists. At least, I do not know those who would be included in the leadership team at least at the city level. This is due to the fact that ours relatively recently began to settle in the United States. The main stream fell on the last 10-15 years. Now Ramin Mamedov is running from North Carolina for Congress.

- What is the current statistics of the Azerbaijani population in the United States, taking into account the accelerated migration in recent years?

- Official statistics do not reflect the real picture. Moreover, the last count Population by National Identity was conducted in 2020 and its results will be made public in a few years.

On the other hand, in the polls, not everyone calls themselves Azerbaijanis. Some call themselves "Azeri", others "Turks". Therefore, in the statistics, the latter are referred to as ethnic Turks. Immigrants from Iranian Azerbaijan can also identify themselves as "Turks" or "Persians" during the census.

According to my research from Facebook data, about 70-80 thousand Azerbaijanis from the Republic of Azerbaijan currently live in the United States. Taking into account that immigrants from Iranian Azerbaijan, the total number of Azerbaijanis is about 400-450 thousand people.

- There are strong ethnic lobbies in the USA. Some of them are actively acting against the interests of Azerbaijan and Turkey. At the same time, the number of immigrants from Azerbaijan and Turkey is growing in America, what steps should be taken to form a strong lobby of Azerbaijanis and Turks, what prevents this?

- Yes, indeed, the United States has strong ethnic lobbies, including the Armenian, Greek, which often acts jointly (against Turkey and Azerbaijan). Of course, to counteract this, there is a need for cooperation between the Azerbaijani and Turkish Diasporas. However, unfortunately, there are certain problems within the Turkish community that have arisen in connection with the “issue of the Fethullah Gulen Movement”.

Formally, specific individuals and organizations registered as foreign agents can engage in lobbying. Azerbaijan is carrying out certain work in this direction, especially after the war.

However, along with this, it is much more important to develop the communities themselves so that their representatives occupy a strong position in American society. Our focus is on sending various petitions to American institutions of power, meetings with politicians and legislators.

Unfortunately, we do not pay attention to the issue of the development of the communities themselves, their members, and the receipt of quality education by young people for a successful career. Other communities have strong representatives, businesspersons allocate funds for these purposes, create teams of functionaries on a paid basis. There are no persons in the Azerbaijani communities who would permanently carry out work on community affairs. 

In our organization, we try to avoid these problems. I myself have personally retired from my personal business. I am engaged only in the affairs of Azerbaijan Union. We are also preparing the creation of the "Union of Young Azerbaijanis" so that young people at an early age can be involved in issues related to the life and interests of our communities.

- Thanks to the Internet, modern ICT, Diasporas do not “move away” much from their historical homeland. In this sense, I would like to know whether your organization participates in the cultural public organization of Azerbaijan.

- Back in 2017, with the help of our team, the baba.az project was launched in Azerbaijan. Its essence is to support children from low-income families in villages or mountainous areas, with limited access to the Internet. Books were delivered to them to broaden their horizons. In addition, polls were conducted among the children about what gift they would like to receive from Santa Claus. Some wrote that they needed shoes because their schools are located 5 km from their home and they cannot go to classes. Others asked for jackets and others. Unfortunately, due to the pandemic last year, the project was suspended.

In addition, we are now working to involve Azerbaijani children in online education in information technology. This project was launched in America under Barack Obama. Translation of educational programs into Azerbaijani is currently underway. This is very important for Azerbaijan. We do not have mass training in IT technologies not only in schools, but also in universities.

Along with this, practical classes are held at a high professional level for people wishing to improve their level of knowledge in the field of programming and other areas of IT.

Classes are taught not only by Azerbaijani specialists working in the United States, but also by their colleagues working in the leading IT corporations in America.

- How do you assess the establishment of ties with the diaspora in Azerbaijan? Do you have any suggestions for improving this work?

In recent years, especially after the change of the team and the leadership of the state committee for work with the diaspora, they began to work actively, to help communities.  I would like, the state bodies of Azerbaijan would not help the diaspora financially. It is necessary to abandon the practice of providing financial assistance to local communities in holding any events. For, people living in America can afford to donate 20-30-50 dollars for the organization of some meetings and events. It would be more useful to finance the publication of books in the Azerbaijani language.

There is a big problem for children who were born in the United States, or moved there at an early age, to learn the Azerbaijani language.    

It would also be more expedient to finance the publication of books and videos in English about the history, material and spiritual culture and other values ​​of Azerbaijan, so that the Azerbaijani diaspora could familiarize local people with their identity.

Campaigns are being held to place banners “Karabakh is Azerbaijan” on the streets, roads. The Americans do not know either Karabakh or Azerbaijan. Such street advertising is used for commercial purposes, to remind of some brands, and therefore spending on the placement of "patriotic" banners is a waste of money.

It is better to increase funding for cultural events and hold them officially on behalf of the Azerbaijani state. Exhibitions of paintings, carpets should be organized more often, and not in small cities, but in well-known museums in large cities and various states.

Activities should be informal for accountability. They should be large-scale with the involvement of American media and aimed at creating a positive image about the country.

Farid Gahramanov, special correspondent for Turan, Fort Lee (New Jersey, USA)-0-