* Azerbaijan is turning to the corner stone of the new US-made geopolitical reality
* Washington increases pressure upon Ilham Aliev, demanding observance of democratic freedom
* Moscow: unambiguous threats and warnings
Putting the BTC pipeline into operation is turning into the beginning of a new epoch in development of the Trans-Caucasian republic.
Opening an oil pipeline, Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC), has become the central event in the political, economic and public life of Azerbaijan over the last month. Creation of the 1767 km long oil pipeline, costing $3,6 billion, which started in 2002 under a US initiative, aspires to reduce America's dependence on Arab oil. BTC will actually deliver not only Azeri, but also Kazakh oil to the West. To judge the importance of BTC one may merely review the list of the high-level guests to the ceremony on its opening and the congratulatory official letters. Leaders of all states who were participants in the project attended the ceremony- the President of Georgia, Mikhael Saakashvili, Turkish President Ahmed Nezhdet Sezer, the President of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbaev, and US Minister of Power, Samuel Bodman, who read a letter of congratulations from George Bush. "The project opens a new era in the development of the Caspian. It will allow Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey to participate actively in the world economy ", was written in Bush's message. BTC will allow Azerbaijan not only to receive high profits from the transfers of its own and Kazakh oil to the West, but also to attract investments and create advanced oil-extracting infrastructure. Azerbaijan will be linked economically to the West and that entails political and military support of the country. Taking into account its weak economy, political instability, dependence on Russia and the conflict with the Armenian Nagorno Karabakh area, Baku desperately requires all kinds of support from the West, and primarily from the USA.
Azerbaijan shares Mikhael Saakashvili's opinion, that BTC "will guarantee peace and stability in the Southern Caucasus". They hope that the West will "link up" both Azerbaijan, and Georgia to its security projects, which are capable of increasing essentially a degree of stability in these republics. Azerbaijan already participates in the program "Partnership for Peace", and military experts of this country took part in a seminar "Information interchange on conventional armaments in Europe", which took place on May 23-27 in Germany. It is expected that BTC`s opening will lead to military cooperation with the West at a considerably higher level. The USA plans to send mobile units to the Republic for protection of the oil pipeline and to create there a center for gathering intelligence information (the "Caspian guard" project, which will cover the countries of the near-Caspian region). According to competent sources in Azerbaijan, an agreement on creation of American military bases in the Republic (in the cities of Kurdamir, Nasosny and Gulli) was signed during the visit of Pentagon head, Donald Rumsfeld to Azerbaijan on April 12.
Azerbaijan is turning toward an economic and geopolitical link between the West and the Central Asian republics, which, from the point of view of Washington, should replace the Arab countries as global suppliers of oil. During the opening ceremony, Ministers of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan signed a Declaration on development and expansion of the "East – West" transport corridor. This declaration is a prelude to the subsequent connection of Kazakhstan to BTC. Transfers of Kazakh oil by BTC will begin in 2010. "It would be accurate to rename the pipeline from BTC to ABTC: Aktay - Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan", Nazarbaev said, emphasizing that BTC is the major mode of transportation of Kazakh oil to world markets. In addition to the Declaration, both countries have signed an Agreement on strategic partnership, which raises relations between the two states to a new level and strengthens Azeri foreign policy positions.
As for Ilham Aliev`s regime, opening the oil pipeline is directly connected to political survival. Azerbaijan opposition activists (mainly supporters of the Popular Front of Azerbaijan) had organized a demonstration in the center of Baku on May 21, the date of the BTC's opening, and which was brutally dispersed by authorities. Demonstrators demanded a change in the electoral system, creation of an independent TV, and an objective investigation into the murder of the editor of the opposition magazine "Monitor", Elmar Guseinov. Authorities arrested some ten people on the grounds that the demonstration had not been approved. The opposition declared that it would hold a new protest on June 4, and it is possible that the authorities will operate more "flexibly", taking into account the sharp criticism by Washington, the EU and the human rights organizations. The representative of the Department of state, Richard Boucher has condemned the actions of the authorities of the Republic, specifically that they were contradictory to the Decree on the constitutional right of citizens to carry out peaceful assemblies signed by Ilham Aliev. The USA ambassador to Azerbaijan, Rino Harnish also criticized the government of Azerbaijan. All this has frightened the authorities of the country, thinking that suppression of certain rights and freedoms will lead to USA support for a democratic opposition. These fears have induced the head of the presidential administration’s political department, Ali Gasanov to express regrets concerning "the compelled use of force" and to declare that " next time we shall take into account complaints of the State Department".
Aliev needs America's support not only because he fears a "Velvet revolution", but also because of growing criticism of his policies by local nationalists. They previously reproached Aliev because he did not try to regain control over Nagorny Karabakh and Azerbaijani territories, which are now controlled by Armenia. This criticism induced the President to appear with a series of bellicose statements directed against Yerevan, accompanied with promises to finish "Armenian occupation of Karabakh" and "to free our lands at any cost". There is no doubt that without US support Baku would not dare to aggravate the conflict with Yerevan, which is presently supported by Russia.
Meanwhile, rapprochement of Azerbaijan with the West, and especially with the USA, is causing undisguised discontent in the Kremlin, which is resorting to unambiguous threats addressed to its southern neighbor. Baku officials do not hide their concern over Russian plans to transfer its military technical equipment from bases in Georgia to Armenia. It is considered by Azeri leaders as barefaced pressure and encourages Ilham Aliev to strive for strengthening relations with Washington.
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