CENTURY OF THE TURKIC WORLD

It has become a good tradition for the leaders of Azerbaijan and Turkey to pay their first official visits to each other's countries. It came as no surprise that just like five years ago, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev visited fraternal Turkey immediately after his re-election for a third term in office. This visit was to demonstrate Baku's highly prioritizing and retaining its political course aimed at strengthening of the close bonds and strategic partnership between our countries. It proceeded in a sincere and cordial atmosphere, and was a working and prolific visit.

President Ilham Aliyev's visit was extensively covered by Turkish and Azerbaijani media, therefore, let's just briefly describe its main points.

In appreciation of the great merits of the leaders in strengthening the strategic partnership and fraternal relations between our countries, President Aliyev was conferred with the high Order of State of Turkey, while Turkish President Abdullah Gul received the Heydar Aliyev Order, the highest order of Azerbaijan.

The leaders of the two countries together visited the Turkish Aerospace Industries company, which has accomplished great success in past years.

The company manufactured the first Turkish military satellites, Goyturk 1 and Goyturk 2. Moreover, since 1987 it has been producing under the US license the modern F-16 multi-purpose fighter aircraft, trainer planes, military helicopters, and ANKA drones. Given the stated intention of the parties to closely cooperate in the development of the military industry, such graphic familiarization with the achievements and potential of the brotherly Turkey is of great interest for Azerbaijan.

The Azerbaijani President held meetings with leading Turkish politicians and senior government officials, including Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and Chairman of the Grand National Assembly Cemil Cicek. On behalf of the President of the Republic of Turkey, Abdullah Gul, and his spouse, Hayrunnisa Gul, a formal luncheon was served in honour of the President of the Azerbaijan Republic, Ilham Aliyev, and Azerbaijani First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva.

The main event of the visit was the third session of the Turkey-Azerbaijan Supreme Council for Strategic Cooperation, which was chaired by President Ilham Aliyev and Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and discussed regional issues, boosting bilateral economic ties and increasing the trade turnover.

During the visit the parties signed seven inter-governmental documents. President Aliyev and Prime Minister Erdogan put pen to the most important one, the joint declaration on the results of the session of the strategic cooperation council.

Also, ministers of the two countries signed a protocol on cooperation in science and technologies; a memorandum of understanding in the areas of science, technologies and industries and on boosting entrepreneurship; an agreement between Azerbaijan and Turkey on international combined cargo transportation; an agreement on security cooperation between the two countries; an agreement on mutual labor activity of the workforce;  an agreement on cooperation in the fields of labour, social security and employment.

Azerbaijani-Turkish relations are consistently on the development course. Therefore, the existing framework of agreements and legal documents is regularly supplemented in order to meet the requirements of a higher level of partnership and alliance. Bilateral trade has reached an impressive amount of 4.2bn dollars, and suggestions have been made to boost the figure to 15bn dollars by 2020.

Mutual investments are increasing as well. According to President Aliyev, over the next five years Azerbaijan plans to invest 15-17bn dollars in the Turkish economy. Next year will see the completion of the major Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway project, and preliminary studies are underway on possible construction of a rail line that would link the Turkish city of Igdir with Naxcivan in Azerbaijan. In 2014, the construction of the strategic gas pipeline ТАNAP is due to begin. Discussions are ongoing on transporting Caspian gas to the Balkan countries, as well as on the possibility of supplies to Naxcivan through Turkey. Moreover, Azerbaijan's state energy company, SOCAR, is successfully implementing a large-scale investment project on the Turkish petrochemical complex Petkim.

Azerbaijani and Turkish politicians, diplomats, analysts and media are closely interacting in the international arena with a view to defending common interests and countering ill-wishers of the two countries. The humanitarian assistance cooperation in the fields of education, science, culture and tourism involves hundreds of thousands and even millions of people. As a result, there is growth in the volume and intensity of bilateral contacts on the level of scholars, businesspeople, journalists, students and athletes.

Therefore, Azerbaijan intends to introduce visa-free regulations for the people from the mentioned categories, President Aliyev said at a joint news conference with Prime Minister Erdogan. The specific groups of citizens who will initially benefit from the visa-free regime and the duration of their authorized stay in the country will be determined as soon as possible by the pertinent ministries and government agencies of the two countries.

 "The 21st century will become a Turkic century. Great success is in store for us in the future," President Aliyev said, summarizing the results of his visit.

Azerbaijan is looking forward to its future not only in light of its own successful development, but is also encouraged by the achievements of the fraternal country. President Aliyev explicitly said that "the power of Turkey is Azerbaijan's power", adding, "Turkey has covered a long and glorious path. It is among the powerful states of a global scale. Turkey's leverage of influence is growing. Not a single initiative can be realized in the region without Turkey's consent. We must make sure that the intergovernmental ties and the relationship between the people are closer. We lived apart from each other for 70 years, but the unity in the hearts of the people did not subside."

Certainly, the focal point in the regional and international issues being discussed was the Armenian-Azerbaijani and Armenian-Turkish relations. To that end Prime Minister Erdogan said the Nagornyy Karabakh problem "is as important for us as it is for Azerbaijan and we continue providing unconditional support to Azerbaijan in the peaceful settlement of this problem".

 "We will succeed in taking joint steps in the area of the defence industry. We are making political decisions in accordance with the 'single nation' principle," Erdogan said.

This is an unequivocal response to those who cherish the dream of sowing discord to undermine the Turkish-Azerbaijani alliance and try to press on Ankara to normalise its relations with Armenia without taking into account Baku's stance and without linking this issue to the need for a pullout of the Armenian armed forces from the occupied territories of Azerbaijan.

Turkey is seeking to capitalize on additional opportunities to break the current deadlock in the negotiations on the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict settlement. Todays Zaman lately reported that Ankara has requested Switzerland's assistance in resolving the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, which will provide an opportunity for mending Turkey's relations with Armenia. The Turkish newspaper said, referring to Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, that if Switzerland manages to convince Yerevan to withdraw from the occupied Azerbaijani territories, Ankara will open up its border with Armenia.

Such a statement on the part of the Turkish foreign ministry is quite reasonable. On the basis of rotation, in 2014, Switzerland will chair the OSCE, whose mediating entity, the Minsk Group, is working to broker a solution of the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict.

The Swiss foreign minister has already stated that assistance in conflict resolution in the South Caucasus through dialogue and confidence-building will be among the priorities of his country's OSCE presidency.

The appointment of the Swiss special

representative to the OSCE on the South Caucasus indicated the seriousness of these intentions. The position was taken by Angelo Gnaedinger, a well-known expert of the Geneva-based Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, who has extensive experience in the settlement of such conflicts.

It is beyond a doubt that advancing the Nagornyy Karabakh settlement will also be high on the agenda of the Turkish-Russian dialogue during the fourth session of the Turkey-Russia High-Level Cooperation Council, along with the Syrian, Iranian and energy issues. Prime Minister Erdogan is due to arrive in Russia on 21 November for a two-day official visit to discuss regional and international issues. During the visit Erdogan is scheduled to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Amid efforts by the mediating OSCE Minsk Group, Turkey and the European Union to give an incentive to a peaceful settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict, in Yerevan they are engaged in playing petty political games and provocations. On 13 November the Armenian parliament voted on a bill regarding recognition by Armenia of Nagornyy Karabakh "independence", which was submitted by the head of the Heritage party's faction, Zarui Postanjyan. However, this initiative was supported by only 10 lawmakers, and the issue was taken off the agenda again after failing to gain approval in the first parliamentary reading. Certainly, any constructivism of the Armenian MPs is out of the question. Simply put, they realize all too well in Yerevan that passage of this bill would spark a wave of international condemnation. Even the countries that traditionally patronize Armenia would have to call for revoking the decision, which torpedoes the process of the peaceful Nagornyy Karabakh settlement. As a result, it would turn out that instead of the currently uncertain status of Nagornyy-Karabakh, which is the subject of the negotiations, international organizations such as PACE, the European Parliament and the UN Security Council would confirm that it belongs to Azerbaijan. Thus, the entire brunt of responsibility for derailing peace talks and potential resumption of hostilities would rest with the Armenians.

The Armenians are known to be skilful in staging different kinds of political provocations, terror acts and spreading historical fabrications and myths. However, as time goes by, both their sophisticated moves and support of some superpowers will increasingly pale in the face of the growing power of Azerbaijan and allied Turkey. 

The main point is to continue advancing confidently along the path of progress and strengthen the Turkic unity. President Ilham Aliyev's visit to Turkey vividly showed the will of the two fraternal countries and their leaders to build a common future.