A meeting in Baku on February 16 of the Chief of General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Valeri Gerasimov and the chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Committee General Joseph Dunford has sparked international media’s curiosity in the past few days.
The Russian Defense Ministry issued a statement after the meeting, in which it announced that the current state of relations between Russia and the United States and international security were amongst the issues discussed at the meeting.
Meydan TV contacted Azerbaijani political commentators living abroad to find out more about the purpose and significance of the meeting.
Journalist Alakbar Raufoglu, who currently works in the United States, thinks that Baku was chosen as a neutral location for the meeting of the generals:
“During these years, the Azerbaijani government has tried to push an image of itself as a player capable of working with both camps, but belonging to neither.
The new US Administration has been trying to coordinate some of its international policies with Russia, on issues such as Syria, Ukraine and Iran. Azerbaijan is the only country in the region who is not overly invest in these issues, nor does it have a strong position either way. Is this a good thing, or a bad thing? Let’s put it like this: Baku officials have nothing to be proud of”.
Raufoglu says the meeting is not very politically significant, but it is indeed surprising that Azerbaijani officials were seemingly left out of the process of deciding the particulars of the meeting. It even seems that official Baku found out about the meeting at about the same time that the Press did:
“The worst thing is that the Russian officials didn’t even ask the opinion of Azerbaijani officials on the prospect of a US-Russian meeting taking place in Baku. This is an important moment. Remember 2007, when Putin offered Bush joint use of the Gabala Radar Station – he didn’t even ask the opinion of Baku on this matter.
“This makes one wonder whether the holding of the meeting in Baku is a response to Azerbaijan’s discomfort that arose as a result of Sergey Lavrov’s comments on Nagorno-Karabakh ‘not being the sole domestic affair of Azerbaijan’. I think the message that is being sent is, ‘who needs whom?’ Another thing to wonder about is could Baku in some way be a tool to bring about a reconciliation and base for military cooperation between Washington and Moscow…?”
Political expert Rauf Mirgadirov links Baku’s being chosen as a meeting point with convenience and security. He says that Baku has not yet become a target for terrorist activities based on political or other issues:
“The second issue was mentioned by the American media. It was said that the Russian general was unwilling to go to Europe for a number of reasons, and the American general was unable to come to Russia. Thus it was agreed to organize the meeting in a neutral space such as Baku”.
Mirgadirov says that he has never considered Moscow’s alleged euphoria over the new administration in the US to be real:
“The new administration will be motivated by triggers such as oil, Iran, the Middle East…and these issues will contribute to the tension. It is very important to discuss these possibly contentious issues and it is natural that the first meeting take place between the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
“They discuss operational plans; it is ministers who talk about political, war or peace issues. Operations that follow political decisions are agreed upon between generals. It means they are discussing preventive measures to avoid coming into conflict. Measures that will lead to the coordination of political issues are being discussed in Munich between Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs Sergey Lavrov and Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.”
