Armenia unfairly blasted Israeli arms sales, Azerbaijani official says
Armenia has unfairly targeted Israel for its sale of military drones to Azerbaijan, Hikmet Hajiyev, an aide to the Azeri president, told The Jerusalem Post over the weekend.
“The Israel- Azerbaijan defense cooperation is over exaggerated” by Armenia to deliberately “undermine” the strong relations between his nation and the Jewish state, Hajiyev said.
Earlier this month Armenia withdrew its ambassador to Israel, Armen Smbatyan, for consultations to protest the private arms sales from Israel to Azerbaijan, particularly drones, which have been used by the Azeri military in the fighting over the contested region of Nagorno- Karabakh.
Smbatyan told the Post last week he believed Israel would soon halt such sales, but to date there is no public indication that such a step has been taken.
Hajiyev, who is the head of Azerbaijan’s Foreign Policy Affairs Department of the Presidential Administration, said Armenia had not targeted Turkey or Russia in that same manner.
Azerbaijan’s defense portfolio “is quite wide and quite diversified,” Hajiyev said, adding his country has used Turkish drones on the battlefield and that the bulk of its military equipment comes from Russia.
“Why are they [ Armenia] only highlighting Israel,” Hajiyev asked.
Israel is a strategic partner of Azerbaijan and his country wants to keep that cooperation in the coming months and years, he said.
“We do believe that all Armenia’s attempts to somehow try to effect Israel- Azerbaijan relations will be completely unsuccessful,” Hajiyev said.
The Israel- Azerbaijan ties are not just a “matter of today, but is a matter of 1,000 years of partnership and friendship between Jewish people and Azerbaijani people,” Hajiyev said. These deep roots have been transformed into the cornerstone of the modern relationship between the two countries in all spheres of cooperation, he added.