Treason and repression

From the International Herald Tribune:

Two members of an ethnic minority centered near Azerbaijan's border with Iran went on trial Thursday on treason charges, the latest case reflecting concerns of Iranian influence in the former Soviet republic.

The article goes on to claim that the arrest reflects "a tug-of-war for influence between the secular, democratic West and Iran, its large southern neighbor," which is fine as far as it goes. Unfortunately, it doesn't go very far.

This country is fraught with ethnic tension -- obviously any Armenians in the country are suspect, but it goes much deeper than that. As recently as six months ago in a village I visited, a Christian church was pulled down by the police, with no particular reason given. The members of that parish must now make a trip of about an hour and a half, to an entirely different region, to get to the nearest church. And that's a bigger trip than it sounds, as most families don't have cars, and must rely on the local marshrutkas, which make few trips. They could, of course, take taxis, but the drive is terribly expensive, and increasingly so, as inflation continues to hit the poor hard.

What's more, the treason charge stems from the publication of a newspaper:

The trial in Azerbaijan's Grave Crimes Court in the capital, Baku, stems from accusations that the newspaper Talysh Voice, whose name comes from the Talysh ethnic group, preached separatism and ethnic bias and insulted members of other groups including majority Azeris.

Talysh Voice editor Novruzali Mammadov and another top official at the newspaper, Elman Guliyev, were arrested in February and are being tried behind closed doors.

The newspaper business is a most dangerous game here, and the government is more than happy to crack down. The law imposes harsh punishment for anyone who "insults" anything anywhere near related to the government.

The government does seem to be vaguely aware of its credibility problem on the issue, recently releasing one jailed journalist. But the conditions are put in such a way that everything sounds friendly, but only to ears that don't know how to hear:

"The judge told me that this decision will not affect my journalism activities in the region," Nasibov said. "He said, ’This year is a probation period for you, and during this time, you can’t distribute false information or be involved in any illegal or inflammatory activity. So you should work in a constructive and objective way. If you do that, you shouldn’t have any problems." [emphasis added]

Given that simply reporting the facts in this country can often be inflammatory, the government may as well have kept him in prison.

Enough about me...

I've been harping on corruption a bit, so this from a friend might have a few interesting things to say. There are parts of it I disagree with, but the characterization of the education system comes from a long time in the trenches, and the take on corruption is pretty apt:

I remember, when I arrived in this country a year and half ago, how excited and optimistic I was about working in the education system here.

And then I started working in the education system, and reality came crashing down around my ears.

Sometimes I wake up in the morning for class, and I think to myself, why bother? What I do doesn't matter. Our presence here is a joke. The government doesn't expect us to do anything really meaningful. In fact, the government has designed their education system so that it's practically impossible to do anything meaningful. By anyone. Ever.

I could teach my ears off and the kids wouldn't learn anything. But it's not just limited to English Language. Their curriculum, which is mainly the absentminded memorization of a collection of facts -- often times these facts are just plain wrong -- doesn't matter because the kids who can afford it will purchase their grades by slipping money inside their grade books. And the kids who can't afford it will pass anyway. The American "No Child Left Behind" system has nothing on education here. Their lowest grade possible is "passing".

But it really doesn't matter that the kids buy their grades, because the are able to buy their college entrance exams as well. And once they buy that, they can buy their grades in college also (it's more expensive, of course). And once you've purchased your college degree, you can go on to buy your job. I've met English teachers who can neither understand nor speak one word of English. Their family decided that they should be an English teacher, and the right palms were greased along the way, and now a new generation of children will be able to grow up, learning nothing because their teacher has nothing to impart.

The education system here, like most of the ministries, are farcical shadows of their previous soviet institutions. Having grown up during the Cold War, I have a healthy respect for what the Soviet education system was. The Soviet Union was not a major competitor in the Space Race without educating their children properly so that they could grow up and help contribute to their government's goal of world domination. Because, let's be honest, that is what the Super States are really after ... eventually. Or, if not domination, then at least deferentiation, where all the lesser countries of the world make decisions that most benefit the Super State in dominance, whether they want to or not.

But the Soviet Union collapsed, and the new republics are now scrambling to pick up the scraps left behind, and mould themselves into a new (or an old) identity and stake their claims on the global playing field. And that's exactly what Azerbaijan is doing right now. They've declared themselves a democracy, because America is in ascendence and Democracy is the "in" government. But democracy is just as much a farce as the education system is, if not more. Azerbaijan is one of the world's 10 LEAST democratic countries in the world. In fact, there are countries that aren't even democratic that have more practicing democracy than this place. The people here don't pretend like they have any power to change that. They know they don't. Not only do they know who the next president will be, the know who will be president after that. [probably the current president's wife -- ed.]

And the people who have so effectively grasped at this power will hang on to it, tooth and nail.

One of the ways in which they are doing this is by neutering the education system. The network of bribes and the tradition of corruption embedded in the schools and universities is favored and encouraged by the government, because an uneducated people is so much easier to keep repressed than an educated populace. Why educate the people? They might realize how crappy their lives are, or, worse yet, they might realize that they have the power to change their own lives, and define their own future. But an ignorant population will simply accept that this is the way things are, and go about their smallish lives and continue allowing the powers that be to exploit them beyond decency.

So why do I wake up in the morning and go to school? Because "Drops Make a Lake". And maybe, somehow, the work I'm doing here will help one person come in to their own. Maybe that one person will ask the right questions at the right time, and an intellectual revolution will occur. Maybe. And the mornings when I can't drag myself out of my bed ... I don't feel so bad anymore.

Go nuclear

An interesting bit of news popped up via an Iranian news service:

Azerbaijan's President, Ilham Aliyev, voices his country's support for the Islamic Republic's right to peaceful nuclear technology, PressTV reported.

"Azerbaijan supports Iran's peaceful nuclear activities and has announced its stance formally," he said.

I'm quite sure there's more to this than we're getting here - certainly, Iran would be happy to take Aliev's words out of context - but it's intersting nonetheless.

Aliev is certainly deviating from the American line that any nuclear activity in Iran is totally objectionable, but is he bending, or is he breaking? It seems to me that in saying peaceful nuclear capacity is acceptable, he isn't accepting Iran's posession of nuclear weapons, but is allowing himself enough wiggle room to please his neighbor to the south without earning too strong an American rebuke. Iran is one of two powerhouses that are pinching Azerbaijan, and there are far more Azeris living in "South Azerbaijan" than in Azerbaijan proper. It would be interesting to find the whole transcript, though

From the horses' mouth

An interesting back-and-forth between a journalist for ANS TV, one of the main news sources here, and the public:

- Why don’t you make any magazine or program about IT (information technologies) in native language? Yes, it is true that programs of this kind was made only in two (AZTV and ITV) of local TV channels. However, their level is not so satisfactory. I think, there is great need for it. May be it is worth to think about.

- I agree with you. Probably, the root of the problem lies in the fact that information technologies are not in native language. In Azerbaijan, rumor is preferred to information, broken phones preferred to communication, and hand-made methods to technologies.
...
-Whom do you see as ideal for yourself in this profession?

-I have no ideal, I have ideas. Telling the truth is everybody’s duty. Therefore, if you are respected for this, then it means there’s a problem in the society.
...
- What do you think about present-day education in Azerbaijan?

- I think... [edit: yep, that's the whole answer]

Deterioration

The feeling among Azerbaijan watchers, from Embassy staff to aid workers in the most remote regions, is that there has been a tangible backsliding. An article in the Guardian is worth excerpting at length:

According to Idrak Abbasov of the Institute for War & Peace Reporting, organisations including the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) say Zahidov was the victim of a staged provocation, part of an assault on free speech and press freedom. The US state department agrees. This month it called on the Baku government to "comply with its stated commitments to respect the rule of law and support the development of independent media".
But overall, outside criticism has been muted - and ignored by Aliyev. Azerbaijan's importance to Washington and the EU as a producer and conduit of Caspian oil and gas, as a Nato-friendly ally bordering Iran, and as a foil to Russia overshadows human rights and democracy concerns.

The West is, indeed, sadly complicit in the backslide on democracy -- Azerbaijan seems to strategically important to push ideals upon, and that's sad.

There's much more at the link, so please do go "read the whole thing," as they say.

Neighbors

In a dusty city in the center of the country, I leave the family I'm visiting to attend a conference. A few children roam the streets, and a cow, and the eternally-blowing plastic bags that litter this area. Beyond that, there's not much sign of activity -- as per usual. Although it's near a regional center, this town is pretty sleepy, as are most in Azerbaijan. I walk along the rock-strewn dirt road to where it intersects with blacktop, a distance of about a few blocks, and continue on to my conference.

I return three hours later, to an amazingly changed atmosphere. I can tell something big is going on, even before I get around the corner to my street. When I get there, I see two massive trucks: a dump truck pouring the black pebbles that will become an asphalt paving, and immediately behind it, a steamroller flattening the stuff into a street surface. The entire neighborhood, it seems, has turned out to watch the event.

What I don't see is just as interesting. The rock-strewn dust of the lower surface has not been cleared, or levelled. There is no gravel or other base. Not even the trash on the street -- plastic bottles and bags, paper, cow droppings -- has been cleared. They're simply paving over all of it, as quickly as possible. They've already finished a good few hundred feet, and in an hour, they've linked up our road with the paved one down the way.

I ask a gentleman standing there how this came about -- I hadn't heard any rumors of development before I left.

"Oh, a relative of a neighbor knew a guy. He was paving somewhere else in town, so he stopped by here." There's nothing more to the story than that.

By the next morning, kids are already chipping chunks of the blacktop off with rocks.

Reorganization

There have been a few shakeups in Azeri regulations lately. The first is a new exam for teachers: they will need to pass tests periodically to prove they still know what they are talking about. On paper, that looks pretty good: there are plenty of teachers who have only attained their positions because they bribed their way in. Across the board, it's easier to yell at the kids to cover for your own inadequacies in teaching.

But in practice, this really probably means nothing more than a new source of bribes for the bureaucrats in the Education ministry. If teachers can bribe their way through the first test, why shouldn't they be able to do so for any tests thereafter?

But sometimes it's not even as subtle as this. Witness new changes for taxi drivers in Naxchevan:

Having decreed the demolition of a market on the outskirts of Naxicevan deemed to be an eyesore, thereby depriving thousands of people of their livelihood in a region where unemployment is already high (see "RFE/RL Newsline," November 6 and 9, 2007), the republic's authorities have now imposed new regulations for an 1,000 private taxi drivers, day.az reported on November 10. Taxi drivers will henceforth only be issued licenses for the use of two models of Russian-made automobile no more than three years old, or for foreign automobiles up to 10 years old. Drivers must re-register their vehicles and obtain special new license plates.

A young man once told me, "In Azerbaijan, we have everything, just not money." Corruption is at the top of the list of reasons why.

Sad fate

Although there may be some growing connections between Armenia and Azerbaijan, there is still a tremendous amount of hatred between the two. And sadly, events like this are all too common on both sides of the border.

In a village in the north of Azerbaijan, a more cosmopolitan place where the Russian influence is strong and at least some of the influence of tradition is starting to wane, I'm talking to a young man who is about to join the military for his two years of mandatory service. "If you don't have money, you salute," he says. "I love my village; I don't want to leave. I'll probably be on the border, with the enemy always in sight."

Later, he says, with pride in his eyes, "Someday there will be a war. We will take back our lands from the evil Armenians. My brothers and I will be there."

Weak

Heydar Aliev is everywhere in this country, despite the fact that he is dead. His son, the current president, is also quite ubiquitous. Their faces grace posters and bilboards along virtually every stretch of highway, on many government buildings, and inside most every classroom. They smile down on their beloved citizens, or pat soldiers on the back, or benevolently pat children, or sternly consider the path of their country.

And they're quite revered. Plenty of well-educated, intellectual, Western-looking folks will tell you that Heydar was a true democrat, and that although "a few irregularities" might have occurred during Ilham's election, it was certainly not the massively corrupt debacle that most election-observing officials would have you believe. Heydar made his country strong, and stopped the wicked Armenians from taking any more of Azerbaijan. Ilham is his natural successor. (And frankly, nobody doubts that Ilham's wife will be the next president.)

But sometimes, someone is willing to step out of bounds, and cracks break through the facade. I was talking to a few young men the other day, teenagers about to finish high school, and was surprised at what they told me.

"Ilham is weak," they said.

Maybe we just need more posters.

Gettin' payed

There are any number of problems with the Azeri education system. Bad books. Crumbling schools that have no heat in the winter. Poorly trained teachers who got their jobs through bribes rather than qualifications. Unmotivated students.

But the fact remains that, since the school year began, many teachers have not been paid. Not a single cent.

And that can't be encouraging.

Offered without comment

Walking in a dusty city on the sea, with dogs lying in the shade and geese on the trash heap, I strike up a conversation with a merchant standing on his stoop:

"You know, I used to work in Russia. It was good there, I had a shop and made money. There was no corruption. Well, maybe 50-50. Here it's 80-20."

An interesting day in the neighborhood

As Azerbaijan looks toward elections next year, it must be pretty confused by its neighbors:

--In Georgia, the Rose Revolution is coming undone, with protestors seeking to end the presidency altogether after some evidence of backsliding. And perpetual worries about Russian meddling are hard to shake.

--In Russia itself, there's not much to laugh about, and it looks like it will be staying that way for a while.

--In Turkey, a new government and anger over the American recognition of the Armenian genocide are less problematic than the tensions of oil prices and terrorism.

Not that there's any question about who will be president for the next term, of course.

More on terrorism

Even as more suspects in the recently-foiled attacks are being rounded up, terrorism is taking a heavy toll on Azerbaijan:

On October 30, Azerbaijan’s Grave Crimes Court convicted Fatullayev, the outspoken editor-in-chief of the independent Realni Azerbaijan and Gundelik Azerbaijan newspapers, for terrorism, inciting ethnic hatred, and tax evasion. The conviction is a culmination of a concerted effort by the Azerbaijani authorities to silence Fatuallyev and his newspapers.

“Fatullayev’s prosecution was politically motivated, and his conviction should be quashed immediately and he should be released,” said Holly Cartner, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The steady rise of politically motivated criminal charges, as well as violent attacks against journalists, is obviously aimed at silencing critical voices in Azerbaijan.”
...
Fatullayev is the eighth journalist in Azerbaijan imprisoned for defamation and other criminal charges. Human Rights Watch has also documented numerous cases of violence and threats of violence against opposition and independent journalists in the country.

A view from the ground on the thwarted attack

A terrorist attack was thwarted here on Monday, and it's getting some play in the news and the blogosphere. The attack has temporarily shut down the British Embassy and greatly reduced operations for American concerns in Baku.

There are a few interesting aspects to the event as I see it here. The first is the Shiite angle, which does a few interesting things. Iran certainly is a neighbor, but I think it is probably not the driver of this attack. Despite a certain growth in religious self-identity in the country since the Soviet collapse, I don't see much indication that it has penetrated very deeply, or turned toward radicalism. In the south, Wahhabi mullahs are making inroads, but from what I've seen, they're viewed with suspicion. Beards are not only not worn, for example, but seen as slightly suspect. The north has a greater number of Sunni adherents, and although that could suggest ties to Daghestani and perhaps Chechen Sunnis, I've seen little sign of that, either. Most of the religious influence seems to be coming from Jordan and Turkey, and especially in the case of Turkey, seems more directed at fostering stronger inter-governmental ties than at fostering any kind of fundamentalism.

Moreover, border control seems fairly strong. It's hardly surprising to me that the would-be terrorists used local weapons (which lead to the timely discovery that these weapons were missing): drug interdiction efforts are very strict (hardly a day goes by when we don't see some drug runner getting caught on the 5 o'clock news), and guns are even harder to get in, due to worries about said weapons getting to Garabagh.

The north is equally quiet. I know a police officer in a mountain town who got into a gunfight with a group of Chechens quite a few years ago. However, it was long ago, and the men were gangsters, holding up cars for money, not radicals. Since those four men were shut down, there haven't been any real problems that I'm aware of.

Another brief word about the military connection. Given the fact that every Azeri male must serve two years, it isn't impossible that some more or less fanatical young man might get access to weapons - as apparently happened here. But as this incident has illustrated, the corruption in the military seems to extend only to the huge sums of oil money being kicked toward the top brass. So it isn't surprising that when a weapons cache went missing, it was discovered fairly quickly. And the soldier in question marked himself even more conspicuously by deserting - a very major red flag for this country.

One other thing has struck me about this attack - that's the much-repeated quote about a "horrifying, large-scale attack." I can't really imagine an attack using 20 grenades, a few automatic rifles, and a machine gun as being terribly large-scale, especially if directed against two embassies (either simultaneously or not). I wonder what we're not being told in this regard?

The overall mood here seems very quiet, and not at all anti-American. I doubt, overall, that this will amount to much.