Azernews.Az

MOSCOW – One of the confidential cables recently released by WikiLeaks, a controversial group revealing secret documents, discloses alleged details of Azerbaijani Defense Minister Safar Abiyev’s meeting with his Russian counterpart Anatoly Serdyukov.

The cable, sent to Washington by the former US Ambassador to Azerbaijan Anne Derse in March 2009, says that Abiyev had paid a trip to Moscow in late January to discuss Azerbaijan’s allegations that Russia had made large-scale arms transfers to Armenia throughout 2008.

Abiyev told the Ambassador that his Russian counterpart stuck to the talking points and denied any involvement. However, "after the second bottle of vodka," that evening, he said, the Russians opened up and admitted to having transferred weapons to Armenia. In an interesting side note, Abiyev quoted Serdyukov as saying: "Do you follow the orders of your President?...Well, I follow the orders of two Presidents."

Responding to the Ambassador’s question about Azerbaijan’s future intentions regarding Gabala radar station, Abiyev replied that it was late in 2007 that Russian Defense Minister Serdyukov approached him about extending Russia’s use of the facility beyond 2012. According to Abiyev, he responded in surprise and asked Serdyukov to explain his request because then-President Putin had said before that Russia no longer needed the site. Serdyukov’s response was "that was a long time ago." Abiyev told the Russians that the time to discuss the renewal of the lease - or the expansion of the facilities or military contingent there - was 2012.

Asked about the Armavir ("Voronezh") station Russia recently put into operation in the Krasnodar region, Abiyev said that it is a relatively "weak" station with much less capability than Gabala, regardless of Russian claims about its effectiveness. He allegedly said this was obvious because Russia had put almost $1 billion into improvements at Gabala over the years and had only spent $70 million on Armavir; and furthermore the Armavir radar only has a range of 2,500 km compared to 8,500 for Gabala.

According to WikiLeaks, other sources give the cost of Armavir at 2.85 billion rubles, or $84 million at current rates, and a range of 4,000 km.

Russia built the station to replace the radars at Sevastopol and Mukachevo in Ukraine, which it lost when Kiev refused to continue their leases.

Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry has dismissed the WikiLeaks report about Abiyev’s remarks made during his meeting with the former US Ambassador.

The ministry spokesman, Eldar Sabiroghlu, said in a statement that he was "astonished" having studied the text of the cable. "This is because as the head of [the Defense Ministry’s] press service, I attend essentially most of the Defense Minister’s meetings, particularly those with foreign ambassadors. And I clearly recall the meetings he had with the former Ambassador Anne Derse. I did not witness such conversations. The text [of the cable] indeed appears to have been concocted and produces the impression of a provocation aimed at disrupting relations between countries."