ANKARA -

Military crowds are matched by live ammunition maneuvers on both sides of the Iranian-Azerbaijan border. In conjunction with the escalation of tension between Tehran and Baku, large-scale maneuvers lasting 4 days between Turkey and Azerbaijan were launched on Tuesday in the Nakhchivan border area.

The Turkish Ministry of Defense said - in a press statement - that the Turkish army will begin on Tuesday large-scale exercises with the Azerbaijani army, "aiming at developing cooperation, coordination and friendship between the Azeri and Turkish ground forces, and will continue until October 8."

The Iranian army, for its part, launched last Friday military maneuvers in the northwest of the country on the borders of Azerbaijan, with the participation of artillery, armored brigades, drones and electronic warfare tools.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev commented on Iranian maneuvers near his country's borders, saying: "Every country can conduct any military maneuvers on its territory. This is its sovereign right. But why now and why on our borders? Why is this after we liberated these lands after 30 years of occupation?" ".

The arrival of military vehicles to participate in the maneuvers in northwest Iran, near the border with Azerbaijan (Iranian Army)

modern old tension

The tension in relations between Tehran and Baku became public in early September, when Azerbaijan began restricting the passage of Iranian trucks carrying oil products bound for Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia.

The current maneuvers revealed tension that is not the first between the two neighboring countries, and it is clear that it will not be the last in the South Caucasus, a region governed by complex regional and international equations and balances, and being a point of contact between Russia, Turkey and Iran.

This will be the third military parade in this region in less than a month, preceded by maneuvers carried out by the Iranian army near the borders of Azerbaijan, after the joint exercises carried out by Turkey, Pakistan and Azerbaijan in Baku last month.

The maneuvers race includes an expression of the geopolitical developments in this region after the last war between Azerbaijan and Armenia in the Nagorno-Karabakh region, a year ago.


Memory of Nagorno-Karabakh

The Iranian statements indicate Tehran's anger at Azerbaijan's close relations with Israel, and Tel Aviv's supplying Baku with modern weapons, including drones.

Another aspect of the tense relations between the two countries is monitored, which is represented in Tehran's negative attitude towards the wide relations of Azerbaijan and Turkey, as Ankara provided great aid to Azerbaijan in the Karabakh war.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh said, "The maneuvers are a sovereign decision, and Iran will not tolerate any presence of the Zionist entity near its borders, and will take what it finds appropriate for its national security."

These statements raised the astonishment of Azerbaijani officials, who expressed their dissatisfaction with Iran's conduct of military exercises on the border with their country in a region that Tehran had never conducted any military exercises, when these borders were under Armenian control during the past three decades.

Iran and Azerbaijan share a border extending about 700 km, part of which was in the Azerbaijani section, and it is under the control of Armenia, which is allied with Iran.

These maneuvers come on the first anniversary of the 44-day Azerbaijani-Armenian war, which ended with an Azerbaijani victory after Baku received great political and military support from Turkey.

This was accompanied by a strenuous Turkish effort to unify what is known as the "Turkish world", which extends from Turkey in the west to China in the east, the most prominent manifestation of which is the Council of Turkish-speaking countries.

The expert, Ali Bakir, spoke about Iranian fears of an increase in Turkish influence in areas he considers strategic (Al-Jazeera)

Crisis factors

In his analysis of the renewed crisis, the international relations expert at the Ibn Khaldun Center, Ali Bakir, states that the Iranian side is resentful of several things, some of which have to do with the rise of Azerbaijan’s regional role and the defeat of Armenia, and the increasing popularity of Azerbaijan and Turkey among the Iranian minority of Azeri origin, which constitutes about 25% A resident of Iran.

Others are linked to the increase in Turkish influence in areas that it considers its backyard.

Bakir told Al Jazeera Net, "For a long time, Iran succeeded in disrupting the political and economic influence of Ankara in Central Asia as the main and shortest passage for Turkish exports. But the victory in the Nagorno-Karabakh battle allowed the establishment of the "Baku - Nakhchivan" line, which shares a small corridor with Turkey. Its length ranges between 8 and 17 km.

Bakir added that Turkey has become connected by land to Central Asia, then towards what is known as the middle corridor linking Azerbaijan with Turkmenistan to China without the need for Iran.

The expert points out that Ankara's success, during the past few years, in building a minimum level of interests with Moscow came at the expense of Iran, whether in Syria or in Azerbaijan, and therefore it is trying to remind the two parties that Tehran has a pivotal role that must not be bypassed.

Analysts do not rule out the development of events in light of the tense relations and the simultaneous exchange of military maneuvers on both sides of the border, to a military clash between Iran on the one hand and Azerbaijan, backed by Turkey, on the other.

Military experts explained that despite the Iranian army’s superiority, by a large margin, over its Azerbaijani counterpart, the latter enjoys the full military and political support of Turkey, which allows it not to fear a possible confrontation with a country that has a complete superiority in population and economy.