NEWS.am posts the article “Turkey and Azerbaijan: One nation, two states of affairs” by Barcin Yinanc, published in Hurriyet Daily News and Economic Review.

“Critical remarks about Turkey by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev are likely to make relations between the two neighboring countries a lot less cozy. Diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks show that Aliyev is distrustful of Turkey and tried to condition energy deals on Ankara backing away from reconciliation with Yerevan.

“The much-touted idea that Turkey and Azerbaijan are “one nation, two states” may be a casualty of classified documents released Sunday by the website WikiLeaks that show relations between the two neighbors are fraught with tension,” the daily reads.

“The leaked diplomatic cables reveal that Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev is resentful of Turkish-Armenian reconciliation efforts and distrustful of Turkey, a lack of confidence that is known within Turkish foreign policy circles,” the source says.

“In one cable, Turkish Undersecretary of Foreign Affairs Feridun Sinirlioğlu is asked about the prospect for progress on a natural gas deal between Turkey and Azerbaijan. In his response, the Turkish diplomat implies that Aliyev is holding an agreement hostage to Ankara’s handling of the protocols between Turkey and Armenia,” the daily informs.

“In a separate cable sent Feb. 25 from the embassy, diplomats say Aliyev confided that the real reason for Azerbaijan to sell gas to Russia was to illustrate “to ‘our Turkish friends’ that they will not be allowed to create a gas distribution hub. The transit deal with Turkey discussed in the Feb. 25 cable was signed in June following the suspension of the ratification of the protocols with Armenia,” the daily says.

“Turkish President Abdullah Gul said Aliyev denied the claims made in the leaks and told him during a bilateral meeting Wednesday in Astana that he was very saddened about them. “Why should he [Aliyev] be against the energy lines crossing through Turkey? I told him, ‘Don’t worry, we did not believe it,’” Gul told Turkish journalists in Kazakhstan.

“Aliyev’s rhetoric against Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party, or AKP, became especially bitter after Turkey signed protocols with Armenia in August 2009 to normalize relations. Although the Azerbaijani president was always careful in his public statements, he made clear his discontent about the reconciliation process, something that was often downplayed by Ankara. The cable from Baku also shows Aliyev has a strong dislike of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan,” the source says.

“The Turkish leadership might already know Aliyev’s sentiments, but knowing about them is one thing; the fact that he talks about his dislike to others is another,” said Mensur Akgun from Istanbul’s Kultur University. Though he said he thought Turkish-Azerbaijani relations would not be strained by the leaks, it said they could cause resentment among Turkish officials,” the daily reports.

“Though Aliyev expressed anger with Turkey for moving ahead to normalize relations with Yerevan without seeing progress on Nagorno-Karabakh, an Azerbaijani territory under Armenian occupation, the classified documents also show that Turkey conditioned its ratification of the protocols on progress on this issue.

During his meeting with Burns, Sinirlioglu appealed for “simultaneity” between the ratification of the Armenian protocols and the efforts to solve the Karabakh issue. “He said if something acceptable to Azerbaijani President Aliyev can be found, then ‘we can move’ the protocols forward,” the cable quotes Sinirlioglu as saying,” the author stresses.

“It is unclear, however, whether this stance by Turkey was a result of Aliyev’s negative reaction or something Ankara had pursued since the beginning of the process.

Turkey’s argument that progress toward withdrawal of Armenian forces from Azerbaijani provinces surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh is a pre-condition to ratifying the protocols “was not part of the agreement and [is] not a position the U.S. supports,” then-U.S. Ambassador to Ankara James Jeffrey wrote in a cable dated January 2010,” the daily concludes.