Who is friends with whom?

"It is truly a great event in the history of our country," Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said, congratulating everyone on the opening of the Baku branch of the Lomonosov Moscow State University. The ceremony to open this branch of the world famous university in Baku was held on 27 February. The attendance at the ceremony of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, first lady Mehriban Aliyeva and a high-level Russian delegation, including the head of the Russian Federation president's administration, Sergey Naryshkin, Deputy Foreign Minister Grigoriy Karasin, Russian Federation Education and Science Minister Andrey Fursenko and Moscow State University Rector, Academician Viktor Sadovnichiy indicated the importance of the event for both Azerbaijan and Russia. 

"This really is a landmark event for both Azerbaijan and Russia," Sergey Naryshkin said, thanking the Azerbaijani president for his support which "played a decisive role in the creation and opening of the university branch". This type of event can quite rightly be considered of international significance and it is not just a matter of two neighbouring countries cooperating in education. 

Today, when the Russian language is losing its position in almost the whole post-Soviet space, the opening of the branch of the Moscow State University in Azerbaijan also has great political significance. It is not just an everyday business deal but the implementation of an agreement at the highest level which is further evidence of the sides' commitment to cultural dialogue and political partnership. Azerbaijan always takes stance in relations with Russia. Unlike its neighbours in the South Caucasus, Azerbaijan did not rush to close Russian schools after the collapse of the Soviet Union and they still function in the country today. A favourite temple of the arts for Bakuvians is the Samad Vurgun Russian Drama Theatre. The Baku Slavic University functions in Azerbaijan where the teaching and study of Russian language and culture take pride of place. Now the Russian language will also be taught at the branch of the Lomonosov Moscow State University by professors and teachers from Moscow. And of course this attention will not go unnoticed in Russia itself. "It is very good that philology is taught at the university. The Russian language is also an element of the far-sighted policy of the Azerbaijani leadership. Overall, great attention is paid to the Russian language in Azerbaijan," the head of the Russian presidential administration, Sergey Naryshkin, said, answering questions from journalists at Baku Slavic University. 

Azerbaijan differs radically from its South Caucasian neighbours in its attitude towards the Russian language and Russian culture. True, it's not really right to compare Azerbaijan to Georgia which does not have the most neighbourly of relations with Russia, to put it mildly. But there are comparisons to be made with Armenia, Russia's bridgehead in the Caucasus. This is how the situation of Russian schools in Armenia was described by a participant in an Internet forum: "After five years living in Moscow my sister returned to Yerevan. My niece studied from the first to the fifth year here. When they returned to Armenia, they could not enrol the girl in a Russian school (one of the parents has to be Russian or a citizen of the Russian Federation). I think every person should be free to choose their school." The Russian schools that are left in Armenia are clearly intended only for Russians. Ethnically Armenian citizens are not allowed to have their secondary education in Russian. During the Soviet period Armenia was almost a mono-ethnic republic and after independence there can be said to be no national minorities left, including Russians.  The Russian-speaking population of the country is today mainly made up of servicemen from the Russian bases. But even their tanks, figuratively speaking, were not able to defend Russian schools in Armenia from closure by official Yerevan. Russian business is present in Armenia, there are military bases too, Russia's military-industrial complex gives Yerevan military gifts worth hundreds of millions, even billions, of dollars and soon there will also be a unit of Collective Security Treaty Organization rapid reaction forces. But the closed Russian schools are unlikely to reappear in the country. Not to mention the classes for in-depth Russian language study which began to open in recent years not without help from the Russian Federation government. And Armenia itself continues to drag out its existence thanks to aid from Russia. So this country is still forced to be a fellow traveller of Russia.

Everything is the other way around in Azerbaijan. There isn't a single Russian tank here and the Russian military-industrial complex is hardly likely to support official Baku if the latter decides to reclaim by force the territory occupied by Armenia. But here not only do Russian schools not close, a branch of Russia's main university opens. Baku does not forget the common historic past, the geopolitical space in which Azerbaijan and Russia live. Whole generations of outstanding scholars, public figures and politicians of Azerbaijan received their education in Russian. Unlike Armenia, Azerbaijan is a multi-ethnic state in which people of different languages and faiths live and thrive side by side, including the many thousand strong Russian community. These were the factors guiding President Ilham Aliyev when he signed the decree on opening a branch of Lomonosov Moscow State University on 15 January 2008. Great respect for the Russian language and work to promote interaction between the two cultures, Russian and Azerbaijani, are just some of the components of Azerbaijani-Russian relations.

And it was Sergey Naryshkin that gave the most accurate assessment of these relations: "Azerbaijan is our main partner in the region in both the economic and political spheres."