On April 24, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev arrived in China to attend the second Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation (Report.az, April 24). This was Aliyev’s second official visit to the world’s most populous country, since 2015. In light of growing Chinese involvement in... MORE

On April 4, during a meeting, in Brussels, of the European Union–Azerbaijan Cooperation Council, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov emphasized that the two sides “are very close” to reaching a new partnership agreement, with over 90 percent of the issues in question already decided. The... MORE

As long as the Russian government was able to pay Chechnya massive subsidies, Ramzan Kadyrov was generally prepared to keep his republic quiet and play by Moscow’s rules as far as his activities beyond Chechen borders were concerned. But now, Moscow faces economic stringencies that... MORE

On March 4, Romania, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkmenistan held a ministerial meeting in Bucharest—the first such quadripartite gathering for these governments. During this meeting of their foreign ministers, the parties issued a joint statement reaffirming mutual respect for each other’s sovereignty, territorial integrity and inviolability... MORE

The third anniversary of the April 2016 “Four-Day War” between Armenia and Azerbaijan is fast approaching (see EDM, April 6, 2016). That deadly clash along the Karabakh Line of Contact ultimately catalyzed the transition of power in Armenia, through a popular revolution, from long-ruling Serzh... MORE

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan held their fourth—although first “formal”—meeting, in Vienna, Austria, on March 29. The statement (Osce.com, March 29) following their talks, which were facilitated by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s (OSCE) Minsk Group, highlighted... MORE

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev signed a decree, on March 16, pardoning 51 persons, who were described as “political prisoners” by international organizations and human rights watchdogs. Although pardons in Azerbaijan are not inherently unusual, the numerical scale of the collective pardon in this case was... MORE

Iranian-Azerbaijani relations have been firmly on track toward rapprochement since the election of President Hassan Rouhani in Iran and the subsequent progress on the nuclear deal and lifting of Western sanctions. In the last five years, the presidents of Azerbaijan and Iran met 12 times,... MORE

Moscow’s recent decision to extradite a Talysh activist to Azerbaijan was a not-so-subtle sign that reinforced previous impressions the Russian government is tilting away from Armenia and toward Azerbaijan in the South Caucasus. The Kremlin is anything but happy with Yerevan’s new government (see EDM,... MORE

Newly elected Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili made her first regional visit to the neighboring country of Azerbaijan. Her trip was of critical importance in terms of both bilateral relations and wider geopolitical developments in the South Caucasus. Specifically, Zourabichvili’s arrival in Baku, on February 27,... MORE