EMERGENCY DEMOCRACY

The situation in Georgia over the past few weeks has attracted a great deal of attention from the international media and become a topic of interest amongst European leaders and human rights organizations. The situation next door is, of course, not without interest for us in Azerbaijan too.

Now that the tension in Georgia has eased and the opposition, or at least some of them, have agreed with President Saakashvili's decision to hold early presidential elections, we will try to assess what happened in our neighbouring republic. In the past few years many people in the world, and especially in Europe, have considered the so-called "rose revolution" a standard scenario for the democratic expression of the will of the masses. At that time interest in replacing the unpopular Shevardnadze regime with a dynamic pro-American and pro-Western (today these are no longer one and the same) leader eclipsed for many freedom-loving politicians and analysts the obvious fact that this change was itself a genuine state coup.

Since 2004 Georgia has been held up as an example to its neighbours, including Azerbaijan. Clear evidence was ignored of increasing authoritarianism in the political and economic life of the country, of the suppression of opponents and the opposition and of the violation of the rights and freedoms of ethnic minorities. The latter concerns us in particular. Georgian Azerbaijanis, who have migrated from Borcali (Kvemo Kartli) to Azerbaijan, say that the situation has become unbearable for them there, discrimination against the Azerbaijani minority has only intensified and become systematic with open state support. The revival in the Georgian economy has indeed passed Borcali (Kvemo Kartli) region by and the land reform has left Azerbaijanis who have worked their land for centuries without ownership rights. Tbilisi's administrative reforms mean that Azerbaijanis cannot work in the state structures or companies in the private sector, while the municipal elections, held under the new "democratic" programme, ended with the Azerbaijani majority having no representatives of their own in senior election posts in the areas where most of them live. We can add that reform of the education system (what is known as attestation) ended as expected with a reduction in the number of Azerbaijani schools and the dismissal of ethnic Azerbaijani headmasters, while a wave of Georgian patriotism led to a revival of claims against their neighbour over historical Albanian monuments located on Azerbaijani territory.

The list of Saakashvili's democratization achievements can be continued in the same vein. However, few people abroad paid attention to them. After the dispersal of demonstrators in the Georgian capital, which ended with hundreds of people injured, reaction in the West has now changed. The West has become the West again, the jealous guardian of human rights and freedoms. Georgia remained Georgia all these years with its traditional theatricality in politics, its reviving nationalism, its harsh opposition to the least protected ethnic minorities and economic dependence on its generous Azerbaijani neighbour. Few people in the European capitals expected Saakashvili to act so harshly and cynically. The OSCE's special envoy called on the Georgian authorities "to immediately lift the state of emergency, to restore full freedom of the media, especially all broadcast media in Georgia, to respect the freedom of assembly, and to ensure all conditions for free and fair elections". The USA, NATO and the OSCE in one form or another condemned the dispersal of the demonstration and the introduction of a state of emergency in Georgia. The UN high commissioner for human rights was "particularly worried over reports of disproportionate use of force, the detention of opposition leaders and the beating of demonstrators". 

The recent events in Georgia revealed the weakness and lack of coordination of the local opposition, its inability to provide serious political opposition to the authorities. But the danger does not lie here, so much as in the prospect that the expected defeat of the opposition candidate at the presidential elections will strengthen Saakashvili's personal authority and intensify authoritarian trends in Georgia, which in turn could lead to a fresh assault on the rights of ethnic minorities. In this regard the question arises of what kind of Georgia we need. Of course, we need a stable, successful and friendly neighbour which can guarantee the uninterrupted operation of international transport and energy corridors and the implementation of our investment projects there. But we also need Georgian authorities that have equal respect for the rights not only of Georgians, but also of other ethnic groups who are citizens of the country, a Georgia that would not rock the regional boat and create additional threats to our common interests in the South Caucasus.