Baku has stated that that it won’t let Azerbaijan’s territory to be used in strikes against neightouring Iran, following large-scale Israeli attacks on Iran this week.
“Azerbaijan will never allow its territory to be used for attacks on third countries, including friendly Iran,” Azerbaijan’s Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov said in a phone call with his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi on Saturday. Expressing concerns over the escalation of tension, Minister Bayramov warned that the “conflict risked engulfing the broader region,” and urged “diplomatic efforts to prevent further escalation,” the Azerbaijani foreign ministry press service said. Bayramov said it was important to resolve the conflict only through dialogue and diplomatic means in line with the norms and principles of international law.
Furthermore, the ministry stated that Azerbaijan helped land transit through its territory after Iran closed its airspace in response to the Israeli strikes. The Azerbaijani media reported that Baku was facilitating evacuation of foreign citizens from Iran.
Earlier on the same day, Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry expressed “deep concerns” over Israel’s “unilateral attacks” on Iran. The ministry called for an ‘immediate cessation of hostilities and adherence to international law’. However, the ministry stopped short of condemning Israel’s deadly attack on Iran on June 13, in which Iran’s key nuclear enrichment facilities – including Natanz – were struck and several high-ranking Iranian officers were killed.
It should be noted that Azerbaijan has close ties with Israel that has sold Baku military weapons worth over a billion dollars. It turn, Azerbaijan is one of the largest oil exporters to Israel, with Azerbaijani oil amounting to around 40 percent of Tel Aviv’s oil exports, according to some reports. By comparison, Armenia is allies with Iran. Tehran maintained relatively neutral position during Nagorno-Karabakh war despite shared cultural, religious and ethnic ties. The relations between Iran and Azerbaijan strained in the past few years and hit the rock bottom in 2023 after deadly attack on Azerbaijani embassy in Tehran, in which the embassy’s security chief was killed. Following the assault, Azerbaijan shut down its embassy and brought back its diplomats from Iran. The relations between Baku and Tehran were back to normal this year after Iran’s newly-elected President Mesoud Pezeshkians – an ethnic Azerbaijani – visited Baku.
