Jeff Goldstein:Azerbaijani government made a serious miscalculation

As high-level Azeri officials have recently raised the possibility of country’s leaving Europe's top human rights body, Council of Europe (CoE), concerns over more advanced anti-West line developing in Baku worry many in the U.S. capital. The move comes just weeks after Baku ordered the shutdown of an OSCE office in the country.

Since 2013 presidential election Azeri officials have been increasingly trying to fundamentally transform their society into their own conviction by saying that democracy ‘doesn’t exist anywhere, rather it is a cover for the western organizations to push for revolutions; and objective truth does not exist in principle.’

What is the Azeri government up to, and where is the country heading with itsanti-West campaign?

TURAN’s Washington D.C. correspondent interviewed Jeff Goldstein, the senior policy analyst for Eurasia at the Open Society Foundations, on current internal situation in Azerbaijan and its relations with the West.

Being a 25-year veteran of the U.S. Foreign Service, Goldstein has played a significant role in human rights promotion. He is also a former deputy to the U.S. Special Envoy working to help resolve “frozen conflicts” in the Caucasus.

Maidan, Gezi worry Azeri government

Q: The Azeri government is increasinglyaccusing the West of being anti-Azerbaijan, anti-Semitist, and even anti-Islamic… What do these all mean from Azerbaijan’s own perspective?

A: It’s very hard for me to say what anybody else’s motivations are. If you look at some of the events that took place [in the region;] what happened not only in the Maidan, but also the demonstrations in Istanbul, I think it worried the government in Azerbaijan. I’ve heard a number of people say that they feel that the fighting in Ukraine gives them an opportunity, because attention is diverted away from them; therefore they can crackdown without any real cost to it. So, that’s some of the speculation, but it’s obviously very hard to know what is going on inside these people’s heads.

Q. Azeri government was looking for boosting its image by hosting international games, just like they did during the Eurovision. Have they succeeded?

A. I think they made a serious miscalculation. They were very much offended by the Sing for Democracy Campaign, and this time they decided they would just simply put all these people out of business before the games, so they could not rain on their big celebration. I think,in doing so they completely misunderstood how things work in the West. In fact, the crackdown itself became the story. So, I think, in essence they undercut their own desire to make this a big success for Azerbaijan. In fact, most of the covers that I’m aware of in Europe are actually quite critical.

EuroGames didn’t succeed in the way the government wanted

Q. How does Azerbaijan’s international image look like now: is it worse than it was two years ago?

A. Among whom: policymakers, public?

Q. Both.

A. I haven’t seen any recent polls. My assumption would be that the vast majority of people in Europe and the U.S. still couldn’t find Azerbaijan on the maps and in that sense I don’t think the European Games succeeded in the way the government wanted.

Among policymakers, I think it’s pretty negative, not only [because of] human rights situation. I mean, if you have President’s chief of staff write a however many page long anti-West, anti-American manifesto and publish it, that can’t help an effect of how people view the country, and the road it’s taking, and the geopolitical niche it’s seeking definitive.

Q. Why would the Azeri government be afraid of revolutions in the neighborhood in the first place? Do you think the current situation in the country similar to pre-Maidan, or pre-Gezi events?

A. It’s very hard to me to say. What we’re seeing just across the way in Armenia right now, sometimes an event that causes popular unhappiness to go from grumbling to protests is completely unexpected. I don’t think anybody was expecting to see this kind of protests we’re seeing now. If such an event came up in Azerbaijan, could there be?It’s possible. Obviously, the economic situation is not good, particularly for poor people and for people outside of Baku.

On the other hand the government has considerable financial resources; they have a very significant security setup. So, it’s very hard to say.

I think there are a lot of very well educated people in Azerbaijan who don’t like the way things are particularly going right now. But, again, whether that crosses the line from disenchantment to active protests -- that’s hard to say.

Human rights commission failed

Q. Some local commentators point to the failure of international community to challenge the government’s crackdown against the West as the reason for current situation...

A. This is hypothetical; if the U.S. and EU had been sterner would they have changed the policy? I don’t know the answer to that. But my personal philosophy is, if you have two possible policy responses, and you’re not sure that either one will work you pick the one that’s right. In this case the right one would have been to speak out more forthrightly, to have pushback harder. Because what Azerbaijan is doing really does call in question its commitments to, for example, its status as a member of European neighborhood, to an alliance with the West, to western values, to the principles of the OSCE, which it clams to support. So I would’ve personally thought that it would’ve been a better policy response. Whether that response would have turned around it, I mean, it’s like sanctions on Russia right now, the Secretary of Treasure said something that, I think, was actually correct, which is, all we can do is create an environment conducive to changing the attitudes. Whether they choose to change their attitudes or whether they choose to suffer the consequences, we have no control over it. But I would have like to see them at least trying to push harder on Azerbaijan in hopes that it might have brought change.

Q. Just to clarify, where is the U.S. standing at the moment; what is Washington’s current position on Azerbaijan?

A. Obviously, you would be better of asking American government officials. From what I understand, an attempt was made to engage on human rights issues with Azerbaijan by creating this bilateral commission that seems to have failed. I think, people in Washington are not happy with what they’re seeing in Azerbaijan. I don’t get a strong sense;however, of any desire to push back particularly hard. Certainly, at the tenor of what is being said is, for example, less critical now than it was when Ambassador Morningstar was in Baku.

Q. Speaking of Ambassador, there was some anticipation that the fact we have an ambassador in Baku would slow down the crackdown, albeit we don’t see any major changes. Some observers worry that it's getting harder for U.S. diplomats to engage with the regimein Baku, which turns down all the calls from Washington…

A. Obviously, there is a much stronger tone of anti-Americanism coming out of high-levels of the government, at least some people from the high levels of the government. I’m sure that has an affect on the operating environment. But you also have to understand that Ambassador Morningstar was not your normal ambassador -- most American ambassadors can’t pick up the phone, call the White House and get the phone answered at the highest levels, while Morningstar could. So that’s the change. But, in general, I’m not really enough aware of what the situation is like for American diplomats in Baku right now.

Q. Could anti-Americanism or anti-West campaign in Baku be readas pro-Russian or pro-any-other-powerin the region?

A. You do see some limited movement in Azerbaijan’s geopolitical orientation towards a more friendly with Russia policy. The fact that Russia has recently agreed to start selling significant quantities of arms to Baku is a big breakthrough. And yet, I think, there are obvious limits on that in terms of the means they have Azerbaijan’s economy, which is hydrocarbons: Azerbaijan is to a certain extent a competitor with Russia.
Then there is a fact of Russia’s continuing alliance with Armenia. So, I think, there are some real limits on how far that will go.

                                            Economy situation -- not good

Q. In economy sphere, what are the most compelling challenges in front of Azerbaijan at the moment?

A. Azerbaijan, on the one hand, has very significant reserves, which puts them in better position than lots of countries right now, to sort of ride out this tough patch. But there are a number of issues. Azerbaijan still gets a not-insignificant amount of money from remittances from people working and leaving in Russia. To the extent that the Russian economy is going to be doing significantly worse potentially for a long period of time, that hurts. Even more so, obviously the decline of hydrocarbon prices hurts. All of these contribute to weakness of the Azerbaijani currency, which hurts, although, on the other hand, since hydrocarbons are priced in dollars that limits it a little bit.

But, I think, the biggest problem to have right now is going to be with proper expectations as for many years Azerbaijanis – not across the board and not equally, but large portions of the society -- have gotten used to a fairly steady increase intheir standards of living. I don’t think the government can deliver on that now.

On the one hand, if you’re an Azerbaijani you’re looking at prices are going up, jobs are becoming insecure and the government is paying to bring rich European athletes to Baku, it must seem, I would think, kind of, as the government’s priorities are not where it would like to be.

I hope that the government has understood from what’s happened now that the best way of making these games into the sort of public relations success in Europe is going to change some of their policy, so that the picture of Azerbaijan they’re presenting is a better picture. I mean this crackdown among other things is robbing them of some incredible brainpower. There are a number of really creative people in Azerbaijan whose voices could really help in discussions of what policies would be best for the country in this difficult both economic and geopolitical situation. But they’re in jail, or out of the country, or forced to be quiet. So, I think, for a number of reasons hopefully the government would come to realize this policy is self-defeating.

That assumes that the government’s major concern is the greatest good of the greatest number. Some people would claim that unfortunately is not what they care most about...

War is real…

Q. Yet the government seems to keep itself in distance from European institutions that the country previously joined along with other South Caucasus countries. What does this new reality mean in terms of Azerbaijan’s position in its own region?

A. The fact that with the economic crisis in 2008 and now what is going on in Greece, the drawing power of Europe is not where it was back then. On the other hand, I think, it is pretty clear that the majority of Azerbaijani citizens would like to see that their country is moving in particular direction of greater freedoms, greater wellbeing, greater democracy, stronger institutions, less corruption, better governance and, I think, when you ask yourself, is it tapped towards or away from the EU, likely to take you more in that direction. Very clearly moving towards the EU is more likely to take the only direction, I think; most Azerbaijanis would like to see their country go…

Q. In security sphere, how does its current policy challengeAzerbaijan from the conflict resolution point of view?

A. My biggest concern right now is that you have governments in both Baku and Yerevan that have significant domestic legitimacy problems. And often times governments anywhere in the world with that problem are finding a little foreign distraction is politically useful at home and that’s how things get out of control and wars happen. So I would be very concerned right now that neither Baku,nor Yerevan miscalculate in way that could lead to greater conflict at the line of contact. I mean you’re in a situation there where there are no peacekeepers or troops on both sides are very close to each other. Last year in particular there was a significant increase among the number and severity of incidents.

I don’t think anybody wants a war. But you can see the potential for something spinning out of control...
 

AlakbarRaufoglu

Washington, D.C.