It turns out that Azerbaijan is now considered a new malicious element on the international stage, threatening France from all directions, actively promoting its models, and discrediting democracy.
French senators are convinced that Azerbaijan, inspired and supported by Russia, uses non-state structures such as the Baku Initiative Group (BIG) to conduct influence operations. These operations aim to destabilize French society by increasing social tensions. Azerbaijan’s actions extend not only to the metropolis but also to France’s overseas territories, including French Polynesia and New Caledonia, aiming to exploit recent unrest. Azerbaijan has also begun a campaign supporting political parties and groups advocating for independence or autonomy in France’s overseas territories and Corsica. Finally, Azerbaijan organized a disinformation campaign called “Olympiya,” targeting the Olympic and Paralympic Games in Paris.
Senators strongly recommend that the executive authorities enhance countermeasures. They acknowledge, however, that Azerbaijan’s malicious activities are a response to the support France has provided and continues to provide to Armenia.
The French senators’ report is intriguing, especially when compared to the support France provided not to Armenia, but to the occupation regime created by Armenia on the seized Azerbaijani lands. We couldn’t find examples in the archives of Azerbaijan sending caravans of humanitarian aid to Corsica or New Caledonia, whereas the selfie of Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo against the backdrop of trucks with “aid to Artsakh brothers” posters is a confirmed fact. We do not recall the Azerbaijani leadership advising the leaders of the Kanaks or Corsicans on how to act, while Macron offered such advice to Pashinyan.
As for Russian support, in the South Caucasus, it is hardly necessary to explain whose outpost Armenia is, which France supports. It is enough to read the statements of France’s ambassador to Armenia, Olivier Decottignies, who stated that his country crossed the “red lines” and provides military support to a CSTO member state.
One could stop here and advise the senators to “study the material,” as they say in the army. However, some things remain unclear from their report. Are the senators completely convinced that Azerbaijan created the social tensions in France and its colonies, pardon, overseas territories? That the “Yellow Vests” protesting against rising fuel prices and participants in protests against pension reform would not have taken to the streets without prompting from Baku? Or did Macron get advice from Baku to raise prices and increase the retirement age? And he, poor naive boy, fell for it? Maybe the Azerbaijani authorities advised the French authorities to break agreements with the leaders of the anti-colonial movement in New Caledonia, which provoked the Kanak uprising? Or is France simply trying to shift the blame for the results of its political fraud onto Azerbaijan?
And as the “cherry on top,” how should one understand the French senators’ assertion that the bedbugs and rats infesting Paris before the Games were delivered by a special flight from Baku, and that this is not the result of Madame Hidalgo’s “wise policy”? And what about the pollution of the Seine River? Is this also Azerbaijan? Or did France manage this on its own? Perhaps the senators should go all the way and declare that the scandalous episodes in the Olympic Games’ opening ceremony were also inserted on advice from Baku?
Seriously, the entire Senate report leaves a very unexpected impression. It seems that while rolling out their campaign to support Armenian aggression, the French were confident that Baku would not dare to respond to Paris. Now it turns out that Azerbaijan is responding quite painfully and tangibly for Paris, and this requires some reaction. Smart and farsighted politicians would call for reducing the intensity of “embraces” with Armenia and adopting a more objective position in the South Caucasus. But unfortunately, the senators are more concerned with Armenian votes than with the interests of France itself. This means they are left only with throwing dirt and writing reports on Azerbaijan, which apparently has more levers of influence in France than the French authorities themselves.
Nurani
