Azerbaijan, or the Republic of Azerbaijan with its official name, “Azerbaijani: The Republic of Azerbaijan” ˈɑzæɾbɑjdʒɑn ɾespublikas, “is a country located in the Caucasus, which is the intersection point of Western Asia and Eastern Europe. Caspian Sea, north of Russia, northwest Georgia, west is bordered by Armenia and southern Iran. If the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic, which is attached to it with the northern and eastern Armenia, south and west is surrounded by Iran, with Turkey, there are 17 km of the border. Azerbaijan has rich cultural heritage. Among the countries with the majority of Muslims, it is the first country to host performing arts such as opera and theater. The Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan was established in 1918, but two years later 1920, on April 26, the Red Army crossed the border into Azerbaijan, and on April 28, 1920 the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic was established and then joined the territory of the Soviet Union. The country regained its independence in 1991 with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. During the Karabakh War, Armenia occupied the Nagorno-Karabakh region and seven regions around this region. Although the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, which emerged in Nagorno-Karabakh, is de facto independent since the end of the war, it is not diplomatically recognized by any state and is considered a de jure region connected to Azerbaijan.
Azerbaijan is a unitary constitutional republic. He is an active member of the Turkic Council and TURKSOY. It has diplomatic relations with 158 countries and a membership of 38 international organizations. GUAM is a founding member of the Commonwealth of Independent States and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons. It has been a member of the United Nations since 1992, and was elected as a member of the Human Rights Council established by the United Nations General Assembly on 9 May 2006. It is also a member of the Non-Aligned Movement, the OSCE and the Council of Europe, cooperating with NATO in the Partnership for Peace project.
There is no official religion in the Constitution of the Azerbaijan Republic and all the main political forces in the country are secular nationalists, but the majority of the people and some opposition forces have Shia Islam. Compared to other Eastern European and Commonwealth of Independent States countries, Azerbaijan has reached high levels of social and economic development and literacy. Unemployment and suicide rates are also low. Azerbaijan has started a two-year non-permanent membership in the United Nations Security Council since January 1, 2012.
Azerbaijan Etymology;
In Steingass’s Persian dictionary, āẕar-ābād, آذر آبادگان āẕar-ābādgān is recorded as the old name of the city of Tabriz. “Āzar” (Persian: آذر) means fire, bayjan or originally known as “Pāyegān” (Persian: پایگان) Guard / Guard (Āzar Pāyegān = “Fire Guards”) “Persian: آذر پایگان. The origin of the names. The period of Zoroastrianism is based on the Persians “Iran.” After the Muslim conquest of Persia, many Persian words began to be written in Arabic and lost their original pronunciation, for example the sounds “G -P – ZH – CH” did not find any correspondence in Arabic. Became known as Azerbaijan.
According to a different view, the name Azerbaijan derives from the Persian Atropat, who ruled the Midian satrapy in the Achaemenid Empire and continued his duty after the conquest of the empire by Alexander the Great. This name is also thought to be of Zoroastrian origin. Atropat dominated the region of Atropatena “nowadays Iranian Azerbaijan”. According to another view, it originates from the name “Kazar, Kuzar, Xazar” of the Khazars, who founded a great state in that region and gave its name to Lake Hazar.
Azerbaijan and its history;
Antiquity
The findings, which were found to be created ten thousand years ago in Kobustan, are included in the World Heritage list prepared by “UNESCO”.
The oldest human settlements in Azerbaijan date back to the Stone Age, the findings of this settlement were found in the Azikh Cave and known as the Kuruçay culture. Remains related to the Ancient Stone Age and Bronze Age were found in caves located in settlements named Tağılar, Damcılı, Zar, Bed-place and necropolises of Leylatepe and Saraytepe.
The first Scythian-Saka settlements began in Azerbaijan in the ninth century BC. After the Scythians, the Manna State “IX BC”, then the Iranian Medes “Persians” dominated the region south of the Aras River “IIV BC”. The Medes established a great empire between 900-700 BC, but were destroyed in 549 BC and the Achaemenid Empire took over their lands. When the Achaemenids captured the lands of Azerbaijan, Zoroastrianism started to spread there. Later, the empire of Alexander the Great became dominant in Azerbaijan, later it was attached to the Seleucid Empire. The Romans also settled here during the Roman Empire. Albanians, the original inhabitants of the region, established an empire in the fourth century BC. In this period Zoroastrianism spread in Atropatena and the Caucasus geography.
Modern history of Azerbaijan;
In 1828, it came under the sovereignty of the Russian Empire. In 1918, Mehmet Emin Resulzade established the Musavat Party and national consciousness and national force was created against Russia and other states. He convened the Caucasus Congress in 1918-1920 and established the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic on 28 May 1918. This state was the first republic in the Middle East. However, it joined the trans-Caucasus Soviet Union in 1920. With the collapse of the USSR on 30 August 1991, it declared its independence again.
Baku has always been the center of Turkism movements in the Caucasus until today. Leaders of this thought were Hüseyinzade Ali Turan, Ahmet Ağaoğlu and Alimerdan Topçubaşov.
Azerbaijan Republic History;
Following the glasnost policy implemented by Mikhail Gorbachev, internal unrest and ethnic conflicts grew in various parts of the Soviet Union, including Nagorno-Karabakh, which remained within the borders of the Azerbaijani SSR. In Azerbaijan, disturbances had already turned into hot clashes in response to Moscow’s indifference, and these conflicts led to calls for independence and separation; events culminated in Black January in Baku. After 1990, the Supreme Council of the Azerbaijan SSR removed the word (Soviet Socialist) from the title, adopted the Declaration of Independence of the Azerbaijan Republic and started using the flag of the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic as the state flag. On October 18, 1991, the Azerbaijan Supreme Council confirmed the Declaration of Independence through the referendum held in the country and became independent; In December 1991, the Soviet Union was formally dissolved. The first years of independence were overshadowed by the Nagorno-Karabakh War with Armenia. At the end of the fighting in 1994, Armenians took control of about 16 percent of Azerbaijan, including Nagorno-Karabakh. About 30,000 people lost their lives and one million people were forced to leave. Four United Nations Security Council resolutions (822, 853, 874 and 884), (demanding the withdrawal of Armenian forces from all occupied territories of Azerbaijan). According to the 1970 census, 510,000 Russians and 484,000 Armenians lived in Azerbaijan; In the 1990s, many Russians and Armenians left Azerbaijan. The Khojaly Massacre, in which Armenian forces massacred Azerbaijani civilians on February 25-26, 1992, is recognized as genocide by many international organizations, including Human Rights Watch.
Azerbaijan and geography;
Azerbaijan is a Eurasian country located in the South Caucasus. Its location is Eastern Europe and Southwest Asia. The geography between 38 ° and 42 ° north latitudes and 44 ° and 51 ° east longitudes is located in the region. The length of its borders is 2,648 kilometers. The 1007 kilometers of Armenia, 756 kilometers in Iran, 480 kilometers in Georgia, 390 kilometers form the border of Russia and 17 kilometers in Turkey. [The coastline has a length of 800 kilometers and the widest field length of the Azeri part of the Caspian Sea is 456 kilometers. The territory of the country stretches for 400 kilometers from north to south and 500 kilometers from east to west. The Caspian Sea, which forms its eastern border, the Greater Caucasus Mountain Range in the north, and the vast plains in the center are the most dominant physical features of Azerbaijan. The Great and Little Caucasus Mountains and Talysh Mountains cover forty percent of the country. Mount Bazardüzü is the highest point of Azerbaijan at “4.466 m” and the lowest point of the Caspian Sea “−28 m”. Apart from these, approximately half of the mud volcanoes nominated for inclusion in the list of Seven Wonders of Nature are within the borders of Azerbaijan.
Surface waters are the main source of water. However, only 24 of the 8,350 rivers in the country are over 100 kilometers long. The entire river flows into the Caspian Sea, in the east of the country. Sarısu Lake, 67 km2 in size, is the largest lake in Azerbaijan. The longest river is Kura River, which reaches 1,515 kilometers when its length outside the borders is added. In addition, the country is the best of some of the islands in the Caspian Sea.
Since the independence of Azerbaijan in 1991, the government has taken drastic measures to protect the environment in the country. However, the national protection of the environment started to develop after 2001, thanks to the increase in the state budget with new revenues from the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Oil Pipeline. Within four years, protected areas doubled, now covering eight percent of the country. Since 2001, the government’s budget to build seven major reserves and protect the environment has doubled.
Azerbaijan climate;
There are mountain masses of Armenia in the south and the high Caucasus Mountains in the north. Mountains of Azerbaijan; Bazardüzü “4.466 m”, Şahdağ “4.243 m”, Pazaryurdu “4.126 m”, Tufan “4.191 m”, Semidağ “4.116 m”, Ragdan “4.020 m” mountains located in the Greater Caucasus Mountain Range, Small Located in the Caucasus Range, Kapıcık “3.906 m”, Gazangeldağ “3.829 m”, Biçenek Overrun “2.346 m”, Delidağı “3.616 m” located in the Karabakh Volcanic Plateau, Kamışdağ “3.724 m” in the Murovdağ range, Hinal mountain “3.367 m. “, Kepez” 3.066 m “, Büyük Işıklı” 3.550 m “located in the Zengezur Mountain Range, Kömürköy” 2.493 m “located in the Talish Mountain Range and Kızyurdu” 2.433 m “mountains. Azerbaijan’s longest river is the Kura River, which flows into the Caspian Sea for 1,364 km. Aras River is 1.072 km long. The largest natural lake is Sarısu Lake with 67.0 km2. The largest artificial lake is Mingeçevir Dam Lake with 605.0 km2.
Although it is surrounded by mountains and high hills, a large part of Azerbaijan is a plain and among the most fertile places of its land is the delta where the Kura and Aras rivers are mixed.
Azerbaijan has a temperate climate, but inland from the Caspian Sea, it is faced with a harsh climate in the high mountains and other high parts. In higher areas, winters are long, cold and snowy, and summers are cool. In the plains, winters are cool and rainy and sometimes snowy, summers are hot and dry.
The country of Azerbaijan is generally steppe in the plains and 25% is covered with forests, some of which are in the mountains. In the northern and southern parts, forests are seen up to 2000 meters high in the mountains. Animals mostly found in the natural life of Azerbaijan, red deer, fallow deer, roe deer, mountain goat, carrot, bison, wild boar, leopard, Eurasian lynx, wild cat, brown bear, wolf, red fox, mountain mouse, squirrel, Caucasian mole Caucasian sharp-nosed rat.
The Azerbaijani climate has 9 of the 11 climate types in the world. Its annual average temperature is over 10 ° C.
Azerbaijan and politics;
The structural formation of the Azerbaijani political system was completed with the adoption of the new Constitution on 12 November 1995. According to Article 23 of the Constitution, the state symbols of the Azerbaijan Republic are the flag, the coat of arms and the national anthem. State power in Azerbaijan is limited only by the law on domestic affairs, but also by the provisions of the international agreement for international affairs. The Constitution, which consists of Executive, Legislative and Judiciary departments, states that it is a presidential republic. Legislative power is held by the unicameral National Assembly and the Supreme National Assembly in the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic. The Azerbaijan Parliament, called the National Assembly, consists of 125 deputies and is elected according to the majority voting system for 5 years for each elected member. Elections are held every five years on the first Sunday of November. The Parliament is not responsible for the formation of the government, but the Constitution, the National Assembly, the approval of the Council of Ministers, and the ruling government, which currently has almost all 125 seats of the Parliament, are important conditions for independence loyal to the New Azerbaijan Party. During the 2010 Parliamentary elections, the opposition parties, Musavat and the Azerbaijan Popular Front Party could not win a single seat. European observers found numerous irregularities in the election process and election day.
Executive power is exercised by the President and the Prime Minister, who are directly elected for seven years. The President is empowered to establish the Council of Ministers, an executive body responsible to both the President and the National Assembly. The Minister of Azerbaijan consists primarily of the prime minister, deputies and ministers. The President does not have the right to dissolve the National Assembly, but has the right to veto its decisions. To override the presidential veto, a majority of the parliament must win 95 votes. Judicial power is vested in the Constitutional Court, the Supreme Court and the Economic Court. The president nominates judges in these courts. The report of the European Commission on Efficiency of Justice refers to the Azerbaijani justice model for the selection of new judges as best practice and reflects the specific features and development pathway to ensure the independence and quality of the judiciary in a new democracy.
Azerbaijan’s administrative system can be called nominally two-stage. The top or top ranks of government are run by the President. The President has the right to appoint the Council of Ministers and other senior officials. The Local Executive Authority is only a continuation of the Executive Power. The legal status of the local state administration in Azerbaijan is determined by the “Local Executive Judge”, adopted on 16 June 1999. In June 2012, the President approved the new Regulation, which gives additional powers and strengthened Local Executive Authorities. Dominant positions in Azerbaijan’s local affairs Chapter 9 of the Constitution of the Azerbaijan Republic deals with important issues related to local self-government, such as the legal status of municipalities, the types of local self-government bodies, their basic powers and relations with other official institutions. The other nominal level of governance are municipalities “Bələdiyə” and municipal members are elected by universal suffrage in Municipal elections every five years. There are still 1,607 municipalities across the country. The Law on Municipal Elections and the Law on the Status of Municipalities were first adopted in the field of local administration on 2 July 1999. The Municipal Service Law regulates the activities, rights, duties, working conditions and social benefits of municipal employees and outlines the structure of the executive apparatus and the organization of the municipal service. The Law on the Status of Municipalities regulates the role and structure of municipal bodies and outlines the state guarantees of legal and financial autonomy.
The law places particular emphasis on the adoption and implementation of municipal programs on social protection, social and economic development and the local environment. Azerbaijan is the only country among the Council of Europe member states that does not have a metropolitan municipality. The Security Council is the negotiating body under the presidency and regulates it according to the Constitution. It was established on April 10, 1997. The administrative department is not part of the presidential office, but manages the financial, technical and material activities of both the president and his office.
Although Azerbaijan has had many choices since its independence and has most of the official institutions of democracy, it is classified as (partially free) by Freedom House. In recent years, many Azerbaijani journalists, bloggers, lawyers and human rights activists have gathered and imprisoned for their criticism of President Aliyev and government officials. In a resolution adopted by the European Parliament in September 2015, Azerbaijan made statements that “the greatest decline in democratic governance in all Eurasia in the last ten years”, and after that on March 17, 2016, the President of Azerbaijan, political He signed a decree pardoning more than a dozen people who were considered prisoners.
This decision was accepted as a positive step by the US State Department. Another amnesty was signed on 16 March 2017, which resulted in the release of other persons considered political prisoners.
Azerbaijan has been harshly criticized to foreign officials and diplomats, a practice called Caviar diplomacy, for supporting its causes abroad and legitimizing its elections in the country. However, on March 6, 2017, the ESISC attacked human rights NGOs and research organizations criticizing human rights violations and corruption in Azerbaijan in a report published by the “European Strategic Intelligence and Security Center”. “ESISC” argued in this report that the report prepared by “ESI” (Caviar Diplomacy) will engage in a political war against Azerbaijan and that the network of European Prime Ministers aims to create a suspicion on the basis of slander. He suggested the Freedom Files Analytical Center (the report is written in the worst traditions of authoritarian propaganda).
The names of the cities of Azerbaijan Baku
“Ganja”
“Terrace”
“Gobustan”
“Doesn’t cross”
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