“To the event held in Azerbaijan I would not call it an election. You should have a great imagination to qualify the reproduction of Aliyev’s clan an election”, – said PAP faction secretary Naira Zohrabyan in the interview with Aravot.am. To remind that a few months ago, constitutional amendments took place in Azerbaijan by removing the restriction to be nominated for presidential chair, by providing an opportunity for Ilham Aliyev to preside lifelong. CIS and PACE observers assessed Ilham Aliyev’s election with 85 percent of votes, positive. The OSCE\ODIHR observers expressed the opposite opinion. Ms. Zohrabyan draws the attention to the fact that Azerbaijan is the one of 47 Council of Europe member states, where the Constitutional provision to be nominated for the presidential chair for more than twice is removed.
“The CE continues to turn a blind eye to this antidemocratic phenomenon. In other words, substantially, according to the Constitution, the CE member Azerbaijan is declared as a sultanate or medieval khanate, where the power is transferred from clan to clan lifelong.” And if the international community continues not to be concerned about this phenomenon, Ms. Zohrabyan notes that over and over again we come to the problem that has been repeatedly spoken about: the international community is turning a blind eye to the anti-democratic situation in Azerbaijan due to one simple reason, there is an oil dependence from Azerbaijan.
Since the application of double standards is not new to us, so our interlocutor says that the evaluations of neither the Council of Europe, nor the European Parliament, nor the OSCE observation mission were a surprise for her. “Many times and in all international platforms it was spoken about it, that yes, unfortunately, Azerbaijan succeeded to involve European MPs and experts in its caviar policy. If Azerbaijan’s caviar hand reaches up to the Obama administration, then, there is a serious problem to the discussion of the international community. Accordingly, this result was predictable for me. Moreover, perhaps, the representatives of the clan displayed a little modesty for not writing 99 % outcome in favor of Aliyev. But, even if such an outcome would be, I’m sure that the international community would give the same smeary assessments.”
Nelly Grigoryan
