By Independent News Roundup
Andrew Korybko Jul 04, 2025 CET
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s decision to stir up highly publicized trouble with Russia caught the Kremlin completely off guard since he’s close to Putin and their countries are officially strategic allies. Three separate officials have therefore posited that “certain forces” want to disrupt their relations. The first to put forth this notion was Russian Foreign Ministry 4th CIS Department Deputy Director Dmitry Masyuk at the at the opening of an event organized by the prestigious Gorchakov Fund think tank.
According to him, “We can see active efforts by certain forces to drive a wedge in our relations with Baku. They are speculating about the crash of the AZAL (Azerbaijan Airlines) plane last December, which, among other things, led to the closure of the Russian House in Baku.” This was followed by Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov, who declared that “Ukraine will do everything possible to add fuel to the fire of this situation and provoke the Azerbaijani side into taking emotional action. This is easy to predict.”
He added that “Russia has never threatened and does not threaten Azerbaijan. Even the incident in question that caused all this - involving investigative actions and work to solve crimes, including against Azerbaijani citizens living in Russia. Of course, the Kiev regime will hone in on this and use it to escalate tensions.” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova then said that “We must remember that [we] maintain relations of strategic allies. And, certainly, there are forces who resent that.”
Apart from Ukraine, whose divide-and-rule interests are self-evident given its ongoing conflict with Russia, the other forces with an interest in disrupting Russian-Azerbaijani relations are Azeri hardliners, Turkiye, the US, and the UK. Beginning with the first, this faction has always disliked Aliyev’s Russian-Turkish balancing act and believe that their country’s interests are best served by siding with Turkiye and the West against Russia. This brings the analysis around to the others’ role in the latest drama.
Turkiye envisages expanding its sphere of influence eastwards into Central Asia by subordinating Armenia as a joint Azeri-Turkish protectorate in order to then streamline its military logistics to that region. Azerbaijan plays an irreplaceable role in these plans due to its geostrategic position so it naturally follows that Erdogan would prefer for Aliyev to facilitate this and join him in containing Russia along its southern front. That outcome would also autonomously align with the Anglo-American Axis’ interests.
The US wants to coerce Russia into freezing the Ukrainian Conflict, in pursuit of which turbocharging Turkiye’s rise as a Eurasian Great Power in Central Asia by “giving” Armenia to it as a joint Azeri-Turkish protectorate is considered an effective means to that end. The UK, which is already close to Azerbaijan, could maximize the resultant containment pressure upon Russia by utilizing the “Turkic Corridor” to Central Asia to expand its military influence in Kazakhstan per their newly signed two-year agreement.
As can be seen, Ukraine, Azeri hardliners, Turkiye, the US, and the UK all have interests in disrupting Russian-Azerbaijani relations, but Aliyev is still ultimately responsible for his own decisions. It’s therefore incumbent on him to do what’s required to restore their strategic ties lest he possibly be perceived by the Global South as a Western proxy and perhaps even provoke intensified asymmetrical responses from Russia. He can still change course if he truly wants to, but it might be too late if he doesn’t act soon.
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