It should be admitted that this time in Azerbaijan there were no such disgraceful phenomena like in December 1988 when Yerevan received congratulating telegrams after the devastating earthquake in Spitak. Celebrations on the occasion of “punishment of Armenians” by Allakh did not take place in Baku. Azeri mass media did not gloat over our tragedy. The majority of Azeri newspapers made casual mentions about the accident, without any comments. (The death of 113 Armenians does not deserve the attention of Baku press.) However there were some newspapers, which expressed their anger on the fact that President Putin announced a national mourning day in Russia because of the Armenian plane crash. Azeris call this an application of double standards by Russian leaders. Newspapers remind that, on February 23rd, 2006 when the roof of Basman market in Mocow fell down and killed about 40 Azeris, Putin did not announce mourning and celebrations of the Soldier’s Day were organized with usual pomposity. In Baku they suppose that the two tragedies mentioned above are equal though the number of victims is not. Meanwhile, it is worth mentioning that after the incident in Basman market Azerbaijan did not announce mourning day too. Taking into account this, it is not clear why do they demand that from Moscow.
Baku newspapers made use of the slightly tactless statement of the head of Moscow Helsinki Group Ludmila Alekseeva who recently said that announcement of national mourning bore political coloring and was a political curtsey towards Armenia – the only country with which Russia has not quarreled with yet. Azeri journalists quote this phrase of Alekseeva with special pleasure. According to the representatives of the political elite of Azerbaijan, Vladimir Putin’s decision testifies to the fact that he is not impartial to Armenians. “Kremlin’s attitude towards Azerbaijan significantly differs from that towards our western neighbors”, Majlis deputy Panakh Hussein said on Thursday. Similar to this was the announcement of his colleague Elmira Akhundova: “Russians do not like Azeris and Armenians know how to make a big show of any tragedy and turn that to their own advantage”, she said. Thus, there can be one conclusion – Russia cannot be an objective mediator in Karabakh conflict settlement…
No one expected official organs of Azerbaijan to condole Armenia. But Aliev could at least condole Russia, since there are 24 Russian citizens among plane crash victims. Meanwhile, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Turkey Abdullah Gul addressed official condolences to his Armenian colleague. On Friday the document was to be delivered to Armenia. By the way many Turks came to the Armenian diplomatic representation in Istanbul and expressed their pain in the condolence book. Nothing of the kind could happen in Baku. However, for the sake of justice, it should be noted that several Azeri deputies told local journalists that maybe it was worth condoling Armenia. After all, Armenians are also people…
