Analysts challenge anti-Turkey smear campaign in Iran

TEHRAN/ISTANBUL

In the wake of heightened tensions on the Iran-Azerbaijan border, geopolitical analysts have criticized some Iranian media outlets and lawmakers for launching a smear campaign against Turkey and Azerbaijan, which they say this is incompatible with diplomatic morality and good neighborly relations.

Tensions between the two countries escalated after Tehran moved troops near the Azerbaijani border and conducted nonstop military maneuvers in reaction to a joint military exercise by Azerbaijani, Turkish, and Pakistani troops, some 500 kilometers (311 miles) from the frontier.

The analysts noted that the slander campaign was conducted despite the common economic, political, religious, and cultural values between the countries.

One of the reasons for the recent antagonism towards Turkey was that Ankara is seen as a strategic and military ally of Azerbaijan, Iranian political analyst and economist Navid Jamshidi argued.

Such negative voices, he asserted, do not belong to the Iranian people, but to the state.

Iran's former ambassador to Baku, Afshar Soleimani, told Anadolu Agency that Iranians preferred to go to Europe via the roadways that run through Azerbaijan, the Caspian Sea region, Russia, and Georgia, rather than through Armenia.

"Iran is concerned that if Armenia's Goris-Kapan route is closed, it will become dependent on Azerbaijan and Turkey," Soleimani opined, adding that this fear is unfounded.

The Goris-Kapan road is the primary traffic artery in southern Armenia. The Soviet-era road skirts and occasionally crosses the internationally recognized border between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Since the end of the second Nagorno-Karabakh War, a roughly 20 kilometer (12.4 miles) section of the road has been under Azerbaijan's control.

Hassan Beheshtipur, an international relations expert, stressed that this anti-Turkey hysteria should not be disseminated among Iran's general public through media.

"Turkey helped Iran while it was under heavy sanctions, and ensured that economic relations between the two countries continued," Beheshtipur said, emphasizing Ankara's support for Tehran in difficult times.

*Writing by Zehra Nur Duz