THE BALKAN AUTUMN OF AZERBAIJANI DIPLOMACY

Croatian President Stjepan Mesic will pay an official visit to our country in early October. This is a return visit. As we know, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev paid an official visit to Croatia in June 2005. The Baku meeting will be a continuation of the early September visit to Zagreb by Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov, during which important issues of bilateral relations in the political and economic spheres and the strengthening of the legal basis of cooperation were discussed.

Croatia is a promising country in terms of the development of mutually beneficial bilateral relations in the spheres of political, commercial, cultural, tourist, energy and humanitarian cooperation, as well as strengthening Azerbaijan's positions both in the Balkans and in the whole European continent and the implementation of trans-continental transport and energy projects. On the whole, Croatia is of great interest to our country in terms of strengthening Baku's positions in the strategically important region of southeastern Europe.

The personality of the Croatian president himself is also interesting, as he is one of the most authoritative politicians in the area, post-Yugoslavia. In the run-up to the Croatian leader's visit to Baku, we would like to point out that, thanks to his principled position, Zagreb clearly expressed its official position on the Karabakh settlement in the jointly signed declaration on the results of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev's June visit to Croatia and stressed its allegiance to the principles of the UN Charter, the main documents of the OSCE and to the peaceful settlement of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict on the basis of respect for sovereignty, territorial integrity and internationally-recognized borders. The unity of our countries' approaches, reflected in this important political document, to the main issues of global and regional politics creates good conditions for the further strengthening and development of bilateral relations.

One of the priority issues to be raised during the Baku summit will be the strengthening of political cooperation between the two countries and their interaction in the international and European arena. Baku is interested in Zagreb's experience in Euro-Atlantic integration and interaction with the EU and NATO. Croatia began its integration into the EU in 1999. In June 2004, it was granted the status of candidate country, and on 3 October 2005, the foreign ministers of EU member countries started the formal procedure of negotiations towards Croatia's accession to the European Union. There is every reason to believe that Croatia will become the next new member of the European Union. Its leadership has drawn up a very effective scheme for dialogue and cooperation with Brussels, of which Azerbaijan could make effective use. For this reason, interaction between our countries on the EU, NATO, the WTO and the OSCE is very promising, and it would be extremely helpful to use Croatia's experience and potential.

A strong factor bringing the two countries closer together is the need for interaction and cooperation in ensuring the energy security of Southeastern Europe and the European continent as a whole. Croatia is traditionally in favour of diversifying the sources and routes of energy supplies to Europe. For this reason, the two countries' interests in this key issue of European energy policy overlap on the modern stage. For Baku, it would be extremely important to turn Zagreb - a key capital in the Balkan region - into its ally in the struggle with Moscow for access to the European market of gas and oil consumers. In this context, Croatia's consistent political support for Nabucco and other projects being implemented by Azerbaijan, Turkey, Greece and Italy is important. Incidentally, Greece and Italy are neighbours of Croatia.

We must point out that there is quite a favourable situation at this point for the successful implementation of such a task. The leadership of the European Union, interested member countries of the EU and leading gas companies of Europe support the Nabucco project more and more firmly. The European Union has appointed a special coordinator for this project and has included Nabucco on the list of four priority projects in terms of ensuring Europe's energy security. At an international conference held in Budapest in mid-September, the prime minister and finance minister of Hungary - a country with a cautious approach to this project - clearly spoke out in favour of speeding up its implementation. "Gas is no longer an issue about heating our homes, this is an issue of national security. The only problem with Nabucco is that it is being implemented very slowly. Our task is to find gas sources independent from Russia," Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcs?ny made a statement unexpected by many, especially to Moscow. In this way, he signalled a fundamental turning point in his country's policy on this issue. Minister of Economy Janos Koka, the leader of the Liberal Alliance of Free Democrats - junior coalition partners of the prime minister, admitted even more self-critically that Hungary had not effectively supported the project in the past: "The mistake was in repeating too often that this project was only a dream, we only helped it to remain a dream." An important factor in favour of this project is the decision of the management of the French gas company Gaz de France to become a partner in Nabucco. Thus the French gas giant may become a sixth stakeholder in the consortium, along with companies such as Austria's OMV, Hungary's MOL, Bulgaria's Bulgargaz, Romania's Transgaz and Turkey's Botas.

The trade-economic aspect of relations with Zagreb is extremely important for Baku. The volume of commodity turnover between the two countries is below one million dollars and totals 0.858 million dollars, which is quite ridiculous (according to the results of the first six months of 2007, in 2006 the figure was 5.1 million dollars). It is clear that such a situation cannot suit Azerbaijan. Croatia has great experience and potential in sectors such as shipbuilding, agro-industry, road construction and the construction of other infrastructure facilities, and the food industry. Knowing this and with Zagreb's interest in the energy problem, the government and private sector of Azerbaijan should be more attentive and interested in trade-economic and investment cooperation with Croatia. With this in mind, it is extremely important to develop the legal base of bilateral cooperation.

During Mesic's visit to Baku, it is planned to sign a joint declaration to confirm the community of the two countries' interests towards important global and regional problems, as well as a number of bilateral agreements directed at ensuring more favourable conditions for comprehensive cooperation. These are, above all, agreements on the mutual protection and encouragement of investment, on trade-economic cooperation, on the establishment of partnership between the Chambers of Commerce, as well as on cooperation between the two countries' diplomatic academies.