The fate of the EU-Azerbaijan agreement is decided in the European Parliament

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-Negotiations with the EU are coming to the end. Ninety percent of the questions have already been agreed. Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov in his statement placed greater emphasis on new energy supply. According to him, Azerbaijan together with its partners is completing the construction of the Southern Gas Corridor, which gives Azerbaijan more opportunities to transport natural gas to the EU markets. For Europe, it will be a new source of energy. According to the minister, if the EU wants to make more gas to make its markets more attractive, then our EU partners should make more efforts. These thoughts lead to some suspicions. Experts say that in this lies the desire of Azerbaijan to appease Europe with gas or, on the contrary, to create a gas threat for it. It turns out that Europe will pay more attention to gas by this agreement.

-Gas-related statements by Elmar Mammadyarov are not really new. In the government of Azerbaijan, not only Elmar Mammadyarov, but almost everyone prefers to talk about gas agreements, economic and commercial issues, transport corridors and so on. I think this leads to the unequivocal opinion that during the negotiation rounds there are no issues of human rights and democracy. For example, on February 5-6, a bilateral meeting was held in Baku purely on issues of democracy, human rights, the state of civil society, and bar issues. I unequivocally exclude the allegations that this agreement will not reflect the issues of human rights and democracy. No, they will definitely be reflected. It"s just that the Azerbaijani side always tries to inform the public in a limited degree about issues that are of higher priority to it. So the statement of Elmar Mammadyarov was no exception.

- What did the agreement envisage, what was achieved and what was not? The fact that the public is not informed about all this is suspicious. Why do not they inform?

-When the question of a bilateral agreement arose on the agenda, approximately in February 2017, for some reason the opposite side, that is, the EU, together with the Azerbaijani government, agreed to some secrecy in the text of the agreement, as well as in the conduct of negotiations. This, unfortunately, does not allow us to know exactly which questions are agreed upon and which are not. It seems to me that everyone, including me, can only answer with assumptions. I think that among the uncoordinated 10 percent is the issue of Azerbaijan"s membership in the WTO, and if not membership, then the application of trade and customs rules adopted by Azerbaijan in this organization. For many years, Azerbaijan has refused to join this structure, giving certain and very weak arguments. Another issue that relies not on assumptions, but on some information, is the acceptance of the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice, an agreement on this issue has not yet been reached. The Azerbaijani side does not look particularly interested in joining this jurisdiction. There is a suggestion that this is related to human rights and democracy. However, on the other hand, there is also such information, according to which, in a sense, the declarative part of the agreement related to human rights and democracy has been agreed. Both sides adopted the declarative part of the agreement, covering human rights in Azerbaijan, democracy, civil society and similar issues. Just before the signing of the agreement or after its signing and ratification, steps can be taken in the areas I have mentioned. It is possible that we will learn it in the near future. It should be noted that the consistency of 90% does not mean the agreement is completed. Statements are made in this direction, and therefore expectations are associated with this. It is not known whether the remaining 10% of questions are agreed upon or not, and perhaps they may not be agreed upon in May.

There is information that President Aliyev, including the leaders of other five Eastern Partnership countries, received an invitation to Brussels in mid-May. This invitation does not mean closing the agreement. A meeting may be provided for the signing of certain agreements or resolutions. In addition, this is a general political meeting.

-Your party members, REAL members Natik Jafarli and Erkin Gadirli stated in the press that the REAL Party wants the speedy signing of the agreement, which is very important for our country. This statement caused a mixed reaction in society. Is it right to want to sign this agreement, when the democratic situation, civil society, the situation in the media is at the lowest level, the presence of political prisoners?

- I personally do not see a fundamental contradiction in the position of Erkin Gadirli and Natik Jafarli. A fundamental contradiction then would have occurred when Erkin or Natik from REAL or someone separately or in the format of the party"s position argued that the agreement should be signed at all costs, without taking any steps. It could actually lead to anxiety and discontent, but dubbing someone from REAL this position is impossible. The Mejlis of the party plans to hold its meeting during this month at which it will discuss the document on the position of the party in connection with the document. Currently, in principle, the signing this document between the government of Azerbaijan and the EU is regarded as a process going in the right direction. That is, if there were no negotiations to sign the agreement, it would be worse. Now at least these negotiations are underway, there are these communications and discussions. In addition, in this context we can raise many questions. Including Erkin Gadirli and Natik Jafarli at their meetings in Brussels - whether it is a question of political prisoners, the plight of civil society or other important issues related to human rights. In short, the position is that, in principle, the presence of this process is better than its absence. It would be better for the process to end with the signing of an agreement. This is the desire and the call of the party REAL. If some steps are needed to sign this agreement, they must be taken. Now, before the signing of the agreement, issues related to political prisoners, the media, civil society, should be resolved; or, serious steps should be taken to solve them. If, after signing the agreement, we see that steps are not being taken and the problems do not find their fundamental solution, including the presence of serious shortcomings in the agreement, then we will actually become allies of the European Parliament. If these problems are not resolved, we will urge the European Parliament not to ratify the agreement. The European Parliament in two resolutions on Azerbaijan pointed to the need to address issues in the field of human rights and democracy. Without ratification, the agreement will not have legal force and will be nothing more than a piece of paper. I think that neither Azerbaijan nor the EU need this. By the way, the technical advantage of the agreement signing procedure is that the text will be made public. We can as soon as possible to assess the text. If it becomes known that the agreement is very weak and leaves aside questions of human rights, and does not adequately meet the interests of the Azerbaijani society, then the process against the ratification of this agreement will begin in an unambiguous manner. Democratic forces, civil society, NGOs, politicians will take an active part in this process.

- In your opinion, can the EU actually make concessions to Azerbaijan on the issue of human rights and democracy?

"I don"t think that the EU, in terms of the text of the agreement, will take a step back in the issue of democracy and human rights." I do not believe that in this agreement, at the request of Azerbaijan, such important issues as human rights and freedoms, the development of democracy, the role of civil society, and others, were pushed aside. I just think that this assumption is even lower than zero, since the public interest of EU officials, NGOs actually located there, and certain interest groups was that human rights, civil society, development of democracy, rule of law are EU values. I do not believe that the EU will sign an agreement that does not reflect these values, respect for them and guarantees.

Taking into account that Azerbaijan is a member of the Council of Europe, it voluntarily assumed the obligations of this structure. I emphasize this. There is an opinion that the agreement related to Azerbaijan will be approximately the same format as with Kazakhstan. In contrast to Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan is still a member of the Council of Europe. This structure, in turn, was created by the main EU countries. There is a certain political process. Most importantly, in contrast to the Kazakhstan case there is a strong opinion of the European Parliament. In June 2018, and in January 2019, the European Parliament, with the majority of votes, adopted a resolution in which there is an open and fully understandable message. If political prisoners are not released, issues with the rule of law are not resolved, the situation of civil society is not improved, and the agreement signed with Azerbaijan will not be ratified. This was not the case in the Kazakhstani business; such a political process did not take place. There were some negotiations, the signing took place, and the parliament ratified the document.

- What specific requirements should the EU put forward to Azerbaijan to sign this agreement?

- The issues that the EU calls on Azerbaijan to resolve are in full view, including human rights. Some meetings on this topic took place. I believe that the EU should not stand apart from these issues. Before the ratification, human rights and freedoms, the protection of democracy, the rule of law, the release of political prisoners, and the improvement of the status of civil society should be realized on the eve of the signing of the agreement, and after signing it as soon as possible. Otherwise, this agreement will not be accepted by society from any spectrum. It will actually deal a serious blow to the image of the European Union. If the EU accepts this agreement even though all of the above issues have not been secured, and will insist on ratifying the document in the future, it will, first, deal a serious blow to its image. As I have already noted, the existence of the possibility not to ratify the agreement, and in particular, the position on this issue of the European Parliament, is a positive fact. It is necessary to use this tool if necessary, if our expectations in connection with the agreement are not justified.