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The United States-based Heritage Foundation organized a conference in Washington on “US policy in the South Caucasus: energy and geopolitics”.
Frederick Starr, Chairman of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute of the John Hopkins University delivered welcoming speech at the event attended by the researchers of the South Caucasus. Two problems – security and territorial integrity – dominate in the South Caucasus, said Starr. In his opinion in difference from other regional forces, US Democratic and Republican administrations being in power over the past 15 years deeply understood all details about the South Caucasus and paid much attention to the problems threatened national security of Azerbaijan and Georgia in transition period. Obvious case of the US activity toward this was the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan and Baku-Tbilisi-Erzrum pipelines. Starr said that tensions in the South Caucasus were inevitable because it was impossible to make prognosis on the Russian, Turkish and Iranian influence on the region, but Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan, which play important role in the energy production, have stable governments in power. Starr criticized Section 907 of the Freedom Support Act and called it a wrong policy directed against Azerbaijan, which locates on the strategic way to Afghanistan.
John Chisky, Officer of the National Defense University noted that Azerbaijan took serious risks while providing Georgia with financial and economic assistances, therefore the United States should support Azerbaijan as, at least, it supports Georgia or more sometimes. Colonel Chisky said that the new US administration must continue the policy of “freezing” Section 907 and recommended to lift this section because it doesn’t meet the national interests of the United States.
Ariel Cohen, Senior Research Fellow at the Heritage Foundation said that Moscow sent serious messages to the NATO allies with its war against Georgia in August, but couldn’t stop the activity of alternative energy corridors. Cohen concludes that Russian-Georgian conflict, as well as last gas row between Russia and Ukraine increased an importance of the alternative gas projects like Nabucco, but existing bureaucracy and non-leadership factors in the Europe complicates its realization.
Fariz Ismayilzadeh, official of the Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy said four main factors prevented the Nabucco realization: security of the pipeline, “frozen conflicts”, threats caused by the Russian military base in Armenia and existence of the terrorist organizations like PKK, which take active part in the big political games. Ismayilzadeh said Turkish-Armenian approach caused negative reaction in Azerbaijan, Russia offered a higher price for Azerbaijani gas than Turkey and different positions of EU countries tackle realization of gas project.
Azerbaijan’s Ambassador to the United States Yashar Aliyev and Consul General in Los Angeles Elin Suleymanov also attended the conference.
