Aliyev attends opening ceremony of new Elite Tent City near Baku

BAKU  - Early on Tuesday, President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, announced the country’s strategic plans for the coming decade. The President assured that with the continued current economic growth and a smart spending policy, the Government will be able to increase the number of Azerbaijani refugees and internally displaced persons from one to four million as early as the year 2020.

Aliyev called the project “Azerbaijan 2020″ and promised an increase in government support in order to achieve the new milestone in the war against Armenia.

“Despite the relative truce over Karabakh, we work relentlessly to defeat Armenia. With every year our economy affords us more and more refugees,” claimed Azerbaijani president. “Just imagine 4 million pairs of eyes sadly looking at the Europeans, Americans and Russians.. Think of the volume of pro-Azerbaijani sentiments to be generated!”

“Azerbaijan is a rich country today. There is no reason why our refugees should not comfortably grow and enjoy every available luxury,” mentioned Aliyev in an interview on Public TV. “We’re a proud nation and we take good care of our internally displaced compatriots.”

Aliyev shared several elements of the project: “The Ministry of Social Security has kicked off a new large-scale program entitled New tents for Young Refugee Families.  Every new family will get a brand new tent and benefit package after each newborn refugee. With the current oil prices,  we can plan on generating roughly 300,000 new refugees per annum in the next ten years. ”

The 2009 statistics show that each tent has its own 50 inch plasma screen TV and Jacuzzi. Multiple labor-seekers from Baku have reportedly been seeking out tent cities searching for summer jobs such as picking up litter and doing house-keeping while the refugees themselves spend their summer vacations in Spain and Italy.

Further detail on project “Azerbaijan 2020″ was revealed by the Ministry of Karabakh Nostalgia. Minister Rafik Bayramov said: “We have embarked on a mass scale construction of new tent cities near Ganja, Baku, and areas in the deep south. The new tent cities will be secured with extremely advanced infrastructure, the best that the 21-st century has to offer. Every tent community will have its own tent-3D-movies, tent schools and tent mosques to accommodate all the needs of a modern Azerbaijani refugee. Ganja is also expected to have a Tent Academy of Sciences”.

Ganja refugee camp has been sister city of Salt Lake, UT for 15 years now

Project “Azerbaijan 2020″ has received global support from the affluent Azerbaijani Diaspora. It has promised continued support to the project. The general public has also received the news with its traditional open-air patriotism and enthusiasm.

As the public embrace the new initiative, the President further adds to the big picture of the concept: “Azerbaijan is a dignified country and has the fastest developing economy in the region. We are no longer the Azerbaijan of slum tent cities with a million starving refugees. The Azerbaijani refugees of  today have fully furnished amenities with all the commodities that an oil-rich country can provide. They have the most expensive tents and consistently receive food and healthcare services which is on par with what refugees receive in the most developed European countries. As the economy boom keeps up, we will be able to afford even more refugees with improved social conditions.”

Turkey also joined the strategic effort promising to invest 3 million dollars to set up new refugee communities in the Nakhijevan exclave area. The Turkish Prime Minister participated in a ceremony launching the first tent neighborhood consisting of experienced refugees from mainland Azerbaijan.

The EU representative to Azerbaijan could not resist his excitement: “The quality of tents and public services at refugee communities are just incredible. Azerbaijan is a truly developed, economically powerful and highly advanced 21-st century state. This country is a refugees true paradise.”

Political expert Richard Giragosian called the Azerbaijani strategy “unfair”. In a press conference on Tuesday, Giragosian said: “Azerbaijanis know how sentimental Europeans are. This is an obvious attempt to manipulate the emotions of the OSCE Minsk Group. Four million puppy-dog eyes is serious political leverage. Our Foreign Ministry needs to react to this. Perhaps we could take the OSCE Minsk group folks to Garni and Geghard more often..”

Simultaneously, sources report that Azerbaijan plans to boost the number of civilian victims of Armenian aggression to three million by 2025, and for this purpose, they have reportedly cut deals with several Chinese morgues.

PACE session torpedoed by Azerbaijani delegate

 STRASBOURG, France – Unprecedented diplomatic scandal broke out early Monday, as head of the Azerbaijani delegation to European Council Samad Seyidov unexpectedly torpedoed speech by Armenian delegate Armen Rustamyan. Azerbaijani diplomat generated a dramatic fart just as the Armenian delegation was justifying the right of people of Nagorno-Karabakh for self-determination. Sources report unusual tension and concentration on Seyidov’s face for ten minutes prior to the unleashed inappropriateness.

Right after the news, Government of Azerbaijan discussed prospect of awarding the Azerbaijani delegate the title of National Hero for “busting Armenian presentation and contribution to return of Karabakh to Azerbaijan”.

Azerbaijani Ombudsman spoke on Public TV of Azerbaijan condemning any potential attempt of European officials to punish the proactive Azeri diplomat. Specifically, Tofik Douchoghlu stated: “We are ready to strongly condemn any attempt of Europeans to punish Seyidov or his political manifesto. Our compatriot featured a strong political message in, perhaps, not a very traditional manner. But, hey, Europe should not forget that Armenia holds 20% of our territory under occupation for decades which forces our politicians to resort to unconventional forms of protest”.

Right after the incident, the security in the PACE building were reportedly clueless on how to handle the situation. Chief of security service within the parliament Jean Sisseux admits: “Frankly, we were not trained on this specific situation, so we hesitated between approaching it as chemical attack or delicately pretend that nothing happened. Eventually we were told it was a political message, so we kind-of backed down.”

'It could be an attempt to intimidate Armenia by metaphoric allusion to Azerbaijan's rich natural resources', Giragosian

Armenian political analyst Richard Giraosian calls the Azeri step “extension of the information warfare”. Giragosian argues that Azerbaijan continues to expand channels to highlight the Karabakh conflict.  “Apparently, with the Armenia-Turkey border process, things are getting ugly in Azerbaijan. I believe this is a metaphorical threat to Armenia. Azerbaijan simply demonstrates how pissed off she is with Armenia and how far she can go to make her point audible. The air-pop itself is not as dangerous as it how it was embraced by Azerbaijani public and the authorities. Azerbaijani society manifested its commitment to support anything that annoys Armenians including, already, acoustic annoyance”, says Giragosyan.

'It is the least I could do to Armenia for occupation of 20% of our territories', Seyidov

Seyidov himself refused to elaborate on his act and only commented: “I’m proud of what I did for my country. Let’s not forget that 20% of Azerbaijan is forcibly occupied by Armenia..”, Seyodov’s eyes twinkled in lurking tears at pronouncing the word ‘occupied’.  “If Armenia does not free Karabakh, we might resort to replicating this and harsher manifestos at UN and other international venues,” concluded Seyidov.

The scandal was moderated to a calm by Turkish Chairman of PACE Mevlut Cavusoglu. The new chairman commented on Azeri step as “slightly out of balance, but not contradicting to the spirit of Europe”. Cavusoglu also noted that the Azerbaijani message could potentially be provoked by Armenian speech-maker Dashnak Armen Rustamyan’s suppressed burp during speech, David Harutyunyan’s prolonged yawn during Seyidov’s speech or Zaruhi Postanjyan’s excessively hot shirt cleavage. (Note: Armenian delegation immediately responded to this by  freezing Postanjyan’s participation in further sessions.)

In the meanwhile Seyodov was received at Baku airport as national hero. Several schools, parks, think-tanks and NGOs were immediately named after him. To further honor the new hero, Azerbaijan renamed NABUCCO gas pipe project connecting Baku to Europe to “Seyidov Stream”.

Aliev Performing Anniversary Threat

Azerbaijan, Baku - A festive ceremony involving President Ilham Aliev and key government officials featured a long-expected speech by leader of the country. A landmark threat to wipe out Armenian forces from Karabakh was attended by representatives of international organizations, embassies and reporters.

The State Statistical Service of Azerbaijan had predicted the landmark 10,000^th threat to take place by end of 2010, however extra effort on part of the government pushed the date closer.  Surrounded by excited officials, as well as invited Guinness book experts, Aliev swiftly took his stand by the tribune.

“We are gathered here today to celebrate one of the most important milestones in the history of Azerbaijan. Today I am going to voice my 10,000^th threat to use force against the occupant forces of Armenia”, said Aliev in an unusually motivated tone.

“I remember my first threat back in 2003 as I assumed the office… Nothing compares to a first threat.. incredible feeling”, Aliev looked down for a second, shaking his head nostalgically.  “

“Proudly, I stand here before you today with 9,999 publicly announced threats, over 5,000 ultimatums and countless nags at Armenia behind my back”, continued Aliev as the crowd ripped in applauds at each announced number.

“Attained results are stunning. The previous threats have scared Armenia so much, that they were forced to modernize their army and build up heavier front-lines. No doubt, another 4 or 5 thousand elaborated threats and Armenian army will be forced to surrender Karabakh. Another 7-9 thousand more threats and Zangezur will be ours!”

After some 5 minutes of introductory suspense Aliev eventually unveiled the hard-boiled message. Slapping his fist on the table Aliev frowned heavily, almost zipping eyelids in anger and said: “Seriously, Armenians, leave Karabakh. I’m super serious.  Leave it, OTHERWISE,” the crowd froze in awe, as Aliev raised his pointer finger in a two-minute additional suspense “we promise to use force!”

Aliev’s speech was immediately released on TV and other media. Azerbaijani politicians flooded press with comments on the unprecedented tough message of the leader to Armenia.

Baku Times called the landmark threat “nation’s biggest success after the 5,000^th threat back of 2006” which marked a turning point in threat development and announcement efforts.

Political analyst Yusuf Bakiev from “Yusuf Bakiev” Foundation comments on the speech as extremely impressive. “This year’s speech is frankly much spicier than anything I heard before. I think we are just a few threats away from liberating Karabakh from the infidel assholes. I mean, let’s be reasonable, 10,000 threats could not go without an impact. It’s simple physics – energy like that doesn’t just vanish, it kicks ass. In this case, Aliev totally kicked Armenian ass”, explained Azerbaijani top expert.

French diplomat: 'Armenia not surrendering after multiple threats - astounding'

French Ambassador to Azerbaijan, Andre Maginot, who participated in the event, shared emotions of the landmark threat ceremony: “This was huge! Amazing threat.. and the frown and.. and the slap on the table. A masterpiece of intimidation. Armenians need to make a sane decision now. I mean, we would definitely surrender. In fact.. we might still surrender ourselves, just in case.”

Armenian Ministry of Foreign Affairs could not provide any comments on the landmark threat. “Unfortunately, we do not watch Azerbaijani TV, so we can’t provide any comments,” said Ministry spokesman to ArmCom.

U.S. does not give up on democracy prospects in Armenia

 On Monday U.S. Embassy unveiled a new program that will help Armenian government in fight against assholes on grassroots level, as well as in government institutions. The new “Anti-asshole Action Project” (AAP) is sponsored by the United States Agency for International Development.

 USAID Mission Director introduced the new program: “Our new strategy is to combine all the anti-corruption, anti-trafficking and anti-fraud programs into a single comprehensive anti-asshole initiative to address Armenia’s main challenge in democratic development. This program is expected to help Armenia follow its international commitment to combat assholes.”

 U.S. Ambassador to Armenia Marie Yovanovitch provided the big picture of the program: “This is a part of U.S. democracy assistance to Armenia. The ultimate goal of this and similar projects in Georgia and Azerbaijan is to create an asshole-free South Caucasus.”

'We are not too optimistic about Iraq or Afghanistan, so we are happy to channel more money for democracy in Armenia,' Yovanovitch

 Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan welcomed the initiative of the U.S. partners. “This initiative perfectly complements our own efforts and specifically our ‘Anti-asshole National Strategy’ which is aimed to reduce percentage of assholes in government institutions and judiciary by 20% through 2010-2013.”  Sargsyan also added: “We are happy to receive the valuable anti-asshole experience and mechanisms from our U.S. and E.U. partners.”

Russian Federation was quick to condemn the new project. Russian Ambassador Vyacheslav Kovalenko called the new program “provocative” and “undermining Russian-Armenian friendly ties.” “U.S. is once again trying to impose a pro-Western regime in Armenia advocating the anti-asshole sentiments. This is a direct involvement into state of affairs of our South Caucasus friend,” said Kovalenko. “The program seems to target our key partners in Armenia and bears an explicitly anti-Russian implications,” added the Russian diplomat.

 The new anti-asshole program envisages creation of 11 Anti-asshole Advice Centers (ASSAC) in all marzes of Armenia and Yerevan equipped with lawyers who will consult and support victims of assholes on both local government and business levels. The Centers will not only help individual citizens, but will also seek to reform legislation to eliminate asshole loopholes allowing the vicious behavior.

 Head of Transparency International, which implements the program in Armenia, Amalia Kostanyan shared hopes and concerns: “The project is really complicated, since Armenia suffers from system-level asshole syndrome and little can be done without political will of authorities. Unfortunately so far they [authorities] prefer to bluff the public and donors by prosecuting only low-rank assholes while the big shots remain immune to justice.” 

 Kostanyan also reminded that Armenia is currently ranked 109th out of 180 countries with similar asshole issues, while only 2 years ago the asshole barometer ranked Armenia 79^th.  

'Why would anyone want to change anything?' head of NA faction

The new program was heavily criticized by head of one of the key parliamentary factions (preferred to remain anonymous) who denounced the anti-asshole program as an attempt to change regime: “The new program is an obvious step to implement a color revolution in Armenia. I’m not saying we support assholes, but we need an evolutionary process and generation change. By quick removal of assholes we undermine fragile government system of the country… It’s just too early.. we are not prepared.”

 Sociologist Aharon Adibekyan brought arguments against radical anti-asshole measures calling this “an untimely initiative”. “Azerbaijan and Georgia are doing much worse on the asshole scale than Armenia. To compare, only some 20% of respondents in Yerevan identified themselves as assholes while in Azerbaijan and Georgia results have been 30 and 40 per cent respectively. The critical threshold after which country is in real trouble is 40 per cent which is not likely in the near future given our demographic tendencies.” Adibekyan also mentioned that 90% of Armenians are against the new anti-asshole programs. “People are just very conservative here. You can’t impose an anti-asshole agenda out of blue,” explained Adibekyan

 Head of Public Chamber Vazgen Manukyan also harshly criticized the new effort. “I’m not sure what this is for and who is implied..” said Manukyan, “but I personally find it very insulting. I mean basically this program may appear to also harm some of the good guys who are by mistake perceived as assholes due to some.. you know… misunderstandings.”

Independent analyst Arthur Avtandilyan believes the anti-asshole program is not likely to find true favor with government. “Basically this is an offer to commit suicide for the government. Similar offers were proposed by U.S. in the past in form of “Free and Fair Elections” program which didn’t not work either. I don’t think this one has any bigger chances,” says Avtandilyan.

 The new USAID program will also raise public awareness on threats of asshole behavior and will establish an anti-asshole HOT-LINE through which citizens will be able to receive confidential advice or schedule an appointment with ASSAC lawyers.

Aliyev Bans Prunus Armeniaca

Government of Azerbaijan finally decided to ban apricots on entire territory of the country. Yesterday evening President Ilham Aliyev addressed the population via television, interrupting the broadcast of everyone’s favorite historic documentary “Ahmed and Tofik Discover America”. Irritation of the viewers grew even more when the President uttered the following words: “Because of its distinctive Armenian, hence anti-Azeri origins, apricots also known as Prunus armeniaca will be banned for eternity”.

Aliyev underlined that capital punishment will be applied to anyone who consumes, stores, thinks, writes about or even paints apricots. As for the 32 tonnes of apricots remaining in the country at the given moment, they will be all collected by Ministry of National Security.

Further plans were disclosed during the press conference given by the Minister of National Security Mahmud Brnipakiev: “The 32 tonnes of illegal apricots will be fed to the 43 Azeri traitors, who voted for Armenia during Eurovision song contest.”

Apricot Ban to Prevent Further Loss of Territories

Brnipakiev was followed by Azerbaijan’s Surgeon General who warned the populace about harmful effects consumption of apricots has. “Our researches identified that consumption of apricots provokes patients to handover lands to hostile countries. That is why in order to prevent further loss of territory we must cease eating apricots.”

The 43 Azeri fans of somewhat overweight, overly enthusiastic members of Armenian duet Inga & Anush are looking for political asylum in Armenia. That way they will avoid overdose of Vitamin A and C and will have plenty of opportunities to enjoy the fair but disturbingly irritating vocal of the two singing sisters.