Chief-of-Staff of the Presidential Administration attended the first international meeting of senior representatives in charge of security issues

07 October 2010, 10:23
Chief-of-Staff of the Presidential Administration attended the first international meeting of senior representatives in charge of security issues

The first international meeting of senior representatives in charge of security issues was held in Sochi on 5-6 October 2010. It was attended by Security Council secretaries, national security aides to presidents and prime ministers, heads of security agencies from 43 countries, as well as the UN Deputy Secretary-General, Y. Fedotov. In opening remarks, the Secretary of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, N. P. Patrushev, read out a message of greeting from Russian President D. A. Medvedev. A message of greeting to forum participants also came from UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Representing Azerbaijan at the meeting were the Chief-of-Staff of the Azerbaijani Presidential Administration, Secretary of the Security Council, Academician Ramiz Mehdiyev, the head of the Foreign Relations Department of the Presidential Administration, Novruz Mammadov, the head of the Department on Work with Law-Enforcement Agencies, Fuad Alasgarov, and the head of the Department on Political Analysis and Provision of Information, Elnur Aslanov.

The Chief-of-Staff of the Azerbaijani Presidential Administration, Academician Ramiz Mehdiyev, addressed the first international meeting with presentations on “Transnational crime and relationship between its most dangerous types” and “Threats to international information security in the emerging global information society: directions of cooperation”. In his presentation on transnational crime, Academician Ramiz Mehdiyev pointed to the threats stemming from organized international criminal activity in the context of occupation of Azerbaijani territories. He stressed that “the merger of terrorist groups with different critical organizations operating in the so-called ‘gray areas’ creates a great potential for crime and is one of the most dangerous trends. It is an uncontrolled zone of this type that has been established in Armenian-occupied Nagorno-Karabakh and seven adjacent Azerbaijani districts. The operational information coming in and the procedurally proven facts provide every reason to believe that this area is extensively used for the production, transit and trade in narcotic drugs, arms and human trafficking, illegal migration, transfer and harboring of terrorists, money laundering and other dangerous types of transnational crime. Being outside the scope of national and international law, this area, as well as other similar areas, remains inaccessible for adequate and timely response to the threats. Therefore, we consider the issues related to the resolution of the Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict as part of the efforts to ensure national and regional security and prevent terrorist and other threats.”

Pointing to the need and urgency of coordinated activities, Ramiz Mehdiyev noted that “Azerbaijan is often confronted with examples of blatant provocations when open calls are made on the world wide web for secessionist activities, the country’s territorial integrity is called into question and state leaders, public and political figures of the country are insulted. It is worth emphasizing that such actions are often taken by information agencies of neighboring Armenia, a country Azerbaijan is at war with. Besides the above examples of “information warfare”, constant attempts are made to make hacker attacks on Azerbaijan's information resources, especially on tragic dates associated with the massacre of Azerbaijani civilians by armed groups of Armenian separatists in March 1918, January 1990 and February 1992 in Khojali.”

During the visit, the Chief-of-Staff of the Azerbaijani Presidential Administration and Secretary of the Security Council, Ramiz Mehdiyev, held bilateral meetings with the Secretary-General of the Turkish National Security Council, Serdar Kilic, the Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine, Raisa Bohatyryova, the State Secretary of the Security Council of Belarus, Leonid Maltsev, the Chief of the Office for Security Policy of the Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sports of the Swiss Confederation, Christian Katrina. During the meetings the parties conducted an extensive exchange of views and analysis, discussed security issues in the region and the world and other issues of mutual interest.

The focus of the Sochi meeting was on the prevention and elimination of consequences of natural and manmade disasters, cooperation in combating transnational crime in its various forms and manifestations – terrorism, drug trafficking, illegal migration, trafficking in arms and radioactive materials, as well as cooperation in ensuring international information security in the emerging global information society.

The Sochi meeting was the first important step towards multilateral cooperation in the sphere of international security.