BACKGROUND: Since the independence of Azerbaijan in 1991, Pakistan and Azerbaijan have developed ever closer and cordial ties. Pakistan was one of the first countries to recognize Azerbaijan, and diplomatic relations were established on June 9, 1992. Officials from both states think they have much in common. Pakistan is in conflict with India over Kashmir, while Azerbaijan is in dispute with Armenia over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh. They also share a moderate leadership with a moderate agenda. Azerbaijan has in recent years emerged as a steadfast ally of Pakistan’s. Relations between both countries were first forged by Musharraf\'s predecessor Nawaz Sharif who visited the Azerbaijani capital in 1995. Azerbaijan’s late President Heidar Aliyev reciprocated that visit by visiting Islamabad the following year. Recently Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf paid an official three-day visit to Azerbaijan, which followed visits to Sweden and Finland. Musharraf and his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev showed keenness to further strengthen Pakistan-Azerbaijan relations to the mutual benefit of both countries. They signed a series of agreements covering tourism, trade, customs, and combating narcotics trafficking and international terrorism. Musharraf reciprocated Azerbaijan’s backing for Pakistan’s stance on the Kashmir conflict by stating that Pakistan backed Baku’s efforts to regain control over Nagorno-Karabakh. Musharraf also expressed keen interest to tap into Azerbaijan’s oil industry expertise to create joint ventures for the exploitation of Pakistan’s own energy resources. Both sides explored ways and means to broaden their cooperation in the economic sphere, ending up by agreeing on boosting cooperation in IT, food, agriculture, and trade. They agreed to cooperate in the gas transmission and distribution sectors in all fields, including cross-border gas pipelines, by sharing expertise and transfers of technology. Both countries plan to exchange expertise and knowledge of regional geological and large scale mapping and topographic surveys of minerals resources including energy and mineral data and information. During talks on bilateral issues, military cooperation was also prominent: the two states concluded a military treaty in 2003. As of now, Pakistan is providing military training to Azerbaijani officers while looking forward toward a wide range of military cooperation in terms of men and material. It is keen to sell its military hardware to Azerbaijan and wants to benefit from Azerbaijan’s sizeable oil and gas resources. Urdu, it was announced, will soon be taught at Baku State University. As part of Pakistan’s confidence-building strategy, Musharraf also communicated in the Turkish language. President Musharraf also addressed the Milli Majlis, Azerbaijan’s Parliament, where he emphasised Pakistani-Azerbaijani cooperation to strengthen the Economic Cooperation Organisation (ECO) and termed it an important vehicle for expansion of trade and commercial relations.

IMPLICATIONS: The visit has a potentially long-lasting affect in terms of forging bilateral cooperation. The visit was an opportunity for the two partners to deepen their friendship and also help in materializing the joint efforts in the struggle against terrorism. It appears to be evidence of the changed foreign policy goals of Pakistan. During a visit to the U.S. in 2003, Musharraf outlined these goals as: establish a country at peace, strengthened by democracy, with economic development and strong friendship with the U.S. An analysis of Musharraf’s statements in the past few months indicates that he is working hard to project his idea of “Enlightened Moderation” in persuasion of his foreign policy agenda. This strategy is based on economic transformation through raising growth rates and educational levels, and poverty reduction through a range of empowering strategies for women, minorities and vulnerable segments of society through direct foreign investment. ‘Enlightened Moderation’ aims at a working democracy and economically thriving civil society, the rule of law and respect for fundamental freedoms and human rights. It seeks to root out terrorism and extremism to create a new political landscape and to prevent a clash of civilizations. It is based on two prongs: one is to be delivered by the Muslim world, consisting of shunning militancy and extremism and proceeding with socio-economic development. The second prong is to be completed by the west and the U.S., by helping in achieving these goals. During his visit to Azerbaijan, Musharraf again tried to achieve support for this idea, including a plan to restructure the Organization of the Islamic Conference to meet the challenges of 21st century. If Musharraf’s statements in Scandinavia and elsewhere launching his doctrine of enlightened moderation were intended to impress on the west his and Pakistan’s ambition to take a lead in representing a force for moderation and pragmatism in the Muslim world, his visit to Azerbaijan was clearly part and parcel of the same strategy, in which Azerbaijan would be a leading candidate to share those values and aspirations. India is strengthening its relations with states of Central Asia and the Caucasus. It established a military base in Farkhor, Tajikistan from where it can keep a close eye on China and Pakistan, and signed a treaty with Central Asian states to join hands in the anti-terrorism campaign. India is also making a serious efforts to increase trade and to exploit the region’s extensive energy resources. The North-South Corridor agreement substantiates this viewpoint. Pakistani policy-makers feel threatened from increased Indian presence in Central Asia; this visit could partly be seen as an effort to counteract that wherever Pakistan finds a receptive audience.

CONCLUSIONS: By all this diplomatic manoeuvring, Pakistan wants to facilitate mutual trade and economic cooperation and to develop commercial and financial institutions, develop human resources and cooperation in science, technology and road, rail and air links to support growing economic activity within ECO. Moreover, it wants to intensify cultural ties as well as counterbalance Indian influence. Due to their geo-strategic location, Azerbaijan and Pakistan can play a vital role as hubs for the flow of energy resources from landlocked Central Asian States to Europe and Asia respectively. President Aliyev expressed his desire for this visit to give a new impetus to bilateral relations and bring them to a new level. Historically, the two countries have had little to do with each other, but this visit is sealing a burgeoning relationship, at a time when both countries are emerging as healthy economic powers in their respective regions. Now apparently Pakistani decision makers have realized that improvement in economic relations is only possible if the Central Asian states are convinced that Pakistan is not harboring ambitions of creating a regional Islamic bloc and that it is not supporting radical elements. In this way, Musharraf’s strategy of enlightened moderation is best answer to apprehensions of CAS.

AUTHOR’S BIO: Asma Shakir Khawaja is an Islamabad-based political analyst, working for the Islamabad Policy Research Institute, specifically on the Caspian region and Afghanistan.