From: farid@mem.odu.edu (F. H. Miandoab)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.turkish
Subject: -->> Hands at Work! - Azerbaijan <<--
Date: 9 Oct 1992 18:36:36 -0500
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
Reply-To: Turkish Cultural Program List <TRKNWS-L%USCVM.BitNet@pucc.PRINCETON.EDU>
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

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A   C O M M E N T A R Y  F R O M :
		 <Azerbaijan Aydinlig Association>

	Popular Front of Azerbaijan came to power after a
bloody crackdown by the Russian troops and a period of
humiliating Azeri losses to Armenians seeking to carve out
a country of " 180,000 Armenians " in the Nagorno-Karabagh
region of Azerbaijan.
	Since taking power, APF has managed to halt the
advancement of the Armenian forces and the indiscriminate
killing of the Azeri villagers. On the other hand, the
government in Baku has had the responsibility of avoiding
putting Azerbaijan and its natural resources on the auction
block!
	This and Azerbaijan's recent success in the military
front has united the ill-wishers for Azerbaijan's territorial
integrity and the disappointed mob of the so called businessmen
who are after a quick-N-easy money scheme in Azerbaijan.
	The result is news releases that follow. They aim at
discrediting the independent government of Azerbaijan in the
international arena by comparing it to the communist government
of the now fugitive ex-president Ayaz Muttalibov, pressure it to
award lucrative business deals to foreign companies and threaten
Azerbaijan with business isolation as long as the current
nationally elected government is in power. Foiling such cheap
shots at the independent-minded and popularly elected government
of Azerbaijan in critical times such as these for the independence
of Azerbaijan is every Turk's responsibility!

                  <Azerbaijan Aydinlig Association>
                         P.O. Box 14571
                       Berkeley, CA 94701
                      FAX: (804) 490-3832
                    Email: farid@mem.odu.edu


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TURKISH BUSINESSMEN TURNED OFF BY AZERBAIJAN'S INVESTMENT CLIMATE

   ISTANBUL, (OCT. 7) IPS - With Turkey taking the lead in
opening up Central Asia and the Caucasus to Western businessmen,
Turkish businessmen have written off Azerbaijan as long as
recently elected President Abulfez Elchibey remains in power.
Elchibey's failure to create a basic legal environment for
foreign businessmen, and, the Turkish businessmen charge, his
government's inability to even grasp the fundamentals of a market
economy are turning off foreign investment.Turkish businessmen say
they have thus switched their focus to other former Soviet republics
in Central Asia, primarily Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.

	Disappointment over Azerbaijan's unwillingness to open
up its economy follows months of lobbying by Turkish businessmen
during which Elchibey is said to have pledged that he would take
the necessary steps of market reform.It coincides with a growing
sense among Azeri businessmen that the business climate in their
country has deteriorated sharply since Elchibey came to power last
spring.

	Azeri businessman Namek Askarov has moved offices in Baku
for the fourth time recently because every time he invests in a
building, he claims it is requisitioned by the government. "The
government declares privatization but in practice does nothing.
Their goal is to maintain power and control. They'll do anything
for that. If I compare business conditions now and under the previous
government it has gotten worse now," Askarov says sitting in his
makeshift office in a private apartment.

	Bulent Semiler, executive director of Impexbank and one of
Turkey's most prominent businessmen, says that despite the ongoing
war against Armenia for the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh enclave,
Turkish investors were willing to take the risk -- once the business
climate is right."The unsettled situation in Azerbaijan would not
deter us. Banks, oil companies, consumer product companies, they
would all go into Azerbaijan, but you have to have the right environment.

	Elchibey has lost his chance, he's in total chaos," says Semiler.
His comments came after failed attempts to establish a bank in Azerbaijan
and after intensive talks with Elchibey during a week-long visit to Baku
during which he stayed at the president's guest house. Semiler said that
for Azerbaijan to reestablish its credibility in the eyes of foreign
investors, it would have to recruit western-trained Azerbaijanis living
abroad or experts from international organizations like the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) or the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

	Turkish banker Aktan Serdar compares Elchibey to Emiliano Zapata,
the turn-of-the century Mexican revolutionary. "The new Azeri leaders are
no different. They don't know how to run a state and they don't how to pass
a law," he says. Serdar recalls an attempt to finance the export through
Turkey of Azerbaijani copper. "They wouldn't allow the export of copper
because that was depriving them of their national wealth. They suggested
we re-export Russian copper through Azerbaijan. We told them that they
could earn badly-needed money. They don't understand it, they're childish,
" he says.

	Another prominent Turkish businessman recalls inviting an Azeri
minister to his house in the U.S. In a shopping mall, the minister saw
a Turkish shop and expressed satisfaction that the Turkish government
had opened a shop in the U.S. Told that the shop was privately owned, as
was the whole mall, the minister reportedly exclaimed: "What? This is not
run by the American government?"

	Unlike other former Soviet republics, Azerbaijan has yet to pass
laws on privatization, trade and real estate. As a result letters of credit
by Azeri banks are not accepted internationally and all trade occurs on a
cash basis. I've given up hope with this government. You visit Kazakhstan
or Uzebekistan and they show you factories. You visit Azerbaijan and they
show you museums. Azerbaijan does not have a single graduate in business
administration," says Semiler throwing his arms up into the air.Semiler
knows what he is talking about when he insists that Azerbaijan bring in
Azeris from abroad or international experts.

	At age 30 he was brought in 1984 to Turkey by then Prime Minister
Turgut Ozal, to help restructure the Turkish banking system. A Turkish Cypriot
by birth, a special Cabinet meeting had to grant him Turkish citizenship.
"We knew nobody when I arrived in Turkey. We had no political affiliations
and no business connections, we didn't know the laws. I went for a week to a
ClubMed on the coast to study the law and came back and said, these laws are
ridiculous. The Azeris have to do something similar. Local Azeris are either
scientists or artists. You can't run a country like that," he says. Says a
Western diplomat: "This place (Azerbaijan) is warped. The question is whether
that's how Azeris are, or whether they have been skewed by the Soviet system."
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