It was convened to address the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, more precisely, the new war in the Middle East. Azerbaijan was represented at this meeting by our country’s Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov.
Note that only 22 out of 57 OIC member states attended the meeting, namely, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Bahrain, Chad, Algeria, Palestine itself, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Cameroon, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Malaysia, Mauritania, Gambia, Pakistan, host country Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Tunisia and Türkiye. The very fact of Azerbaijan’s participation in the meeting in this situation already testifies to the country’s principled position. The same position that our country declared openly and clearly and that has not changed: Azerbaijan, in accordance with the norms of international law, including relevant UN resolutions, supports the resolution of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict on the basis of the principle of establishing a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital. And it was this position that Jeyhun Bayramov voiced at the meeting.
Azerbaijan has also allocated $1.6 million to the UN Agency for the Middle East to help Palestinian refugees.
This is where “red lines” should be drawn. It was in Azerbaijan that the first secular democratic republic in the Muslim East was proclaimed. Our country confirmed its choice in favor of secular democracy after regaining independence in 1991. But at the same time Azerbaijan never forgets about Islamic solidarity in its foreign policy. And these are not just words, but real actions. Azerbaijan has also reiterated its commitment to the peace agenda.
Interestingly enough, almost in parallel with the OIC meeting, the European Union held its online meeting of foreign ministers, where it adopted yet another anti-Azerbaijani piece of paper, predictably full of falsehoods and cheap attacks.
Frankly speaking, there is no doubt that France was the one who commissioned this new farce. Minval has learned that, remarkably, Lithuania was also among the states that supported this statement. Now, this is a country that happily jumps into a new scandal on the South Caucasus track before it even gets out of the previous one. Even within the European Union countries like Lithuania readily take on the role of proxies and puppets of others. And if France is the customer, it finds itself at the forefront of another anti-Azerbaijani provocation.
Here one can easily see another manifestation of Islamophobia, attempts to replace the fundamental interests of the European Union with narrow group lobbying, and an inability to calculate the consequences of one’s own actions at least one step ahead. As is the case with another scheme: according to our sources, the EU mission in Armenia is expected to be extended in the coming days. France obviously sees this mission as an instrument of its neo-colonial policy, expecting to turn it into a full-fledged military base of either NATO or the “European army”, which Macron hopes to build to spite NATO.
It seems, however, that the authors of this idea have forgotten an old political truth. First of all, it will not be possible to make long-term plans with states that change their foreign policy orientation like a weather vane. Second, the European Union has grand plans on the Armenian track, but instead of real dividends, all they get is damaged relations with Azerbaijan.
And third, European politicians have once again failed the test of seriousness and respectability.
