AZERBAIJAN / FILE: President says his country is still at war, as the military puts its equipment on parade

Record ID: 218549

  • Title: AZERBAIJAN / FILE: President says his country is still at war, as the military puts its equipment on parade
  • Date: 27th June 2008
  • Summary: (CEEF) SHUSHA, NAGORNO-KARABAKH, AZERBAIJAN (FILE - JULY 19, 2007) (REUTERS) VILLAGE CHURCH WOMAN WALKING IN STREET
  • Embargoed: 12th July 2008 13:00
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  • Reuters ID: LVA9E7OHXV61MHTXYKPNSWAYMWMU
  • Story Text: Ex-Soviet Azerbaijan staged its first military parade in 16 years on Thursday (June 26) in a show of strength aimed in part at Armenia, its neighbour with which it is locked in a territorial dispute.
    Armenian forces took control of the Nagorno-Karabakh region, internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan, in a war in the 1990s.
    Azerbaijan says it reserves the right to restore its control by force if peace talks fail.
    A resumption of hostilities could disrupt oil supplies from Azerbaijan, which exports about 700,000 barrels of oil a day to world markets, most of it via a pipeline operated by a BP -led <BP.L> international consortium.
    Troops, multiple rocket launch systems, armoured personnel carriers, tanks and unmanned reconnaissance planes were paraded in front of the Soviet-built government headquarters in capital, Baku, watched over by Azerbaijan's President Ilham Aliyev.
    Attack helicopters, bombers and fighter jets later flew in formation past the building, on the shores of the Caspian Sea, in a parade that lasted over an hour.
    Much of the equipment on show was Soviet-designed but there was also Western gear and troops were fitted with NATO-style uniforms -- part of a modernisation of the armed forces funded with a ten-fold rise in defence spending since 2003.

    "Azerbaijan is at war, the war is not over yet. Only one stage of it is finished with the ceasefire regime. This regime is maintained, but it does not mean that the war is over," Aliyev, who succeeded his own father as president in a 2003 election, said in a speech to the parade.
    Aliyev added that negotiations with Armenia were continuing, but said they have been going on for a very long time and that people were tired of them. He said the negotiations could not go on for ever.
    The war over Nagorno-Karabakh killed about 35,000 people and forced over a million to leave their homes. Many of them are still living as refugees.
    The region, and several Azeri districts surrounding it, are now run by ethnic Armenian separatists with support from Armenia. No state recognises Nagorno-Karabakh's split from Azerbaijan.
    Though a fragile ceasefire is in force, the two sides have never signed a peace deal to formally end the war, and their armies are locked in a tense stand-off. Soldiers are frequently killed in skirmishes.
    Talks mediated by envoys from France, Russia and the United States have failed to produce a peace deal.
    Aliyev said at the parade Azerbaijan's annual defence spending was now 2 billion USD. He said the increase was in line with an overall growth in state spending in Azerbaijan, which has one of the world's fastest-growing economies.
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