Azerbaijan should hurry to strengthen military potential in Caspian Sea

PanARMENIAN.Net - Azerbaijan should accelerate the process of strengthening military potential in the Caspian Sea to ensure its security, experts say.



"Due to support from abroad, Azerbaijan, together with other Caspian countries - Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan - may strengthen its military potential in Caspian to strengthen its water borders," independent military expert Alekper Mammadov said.



"Strengthening military capacity in the Caspian should be one of the key tasks of Azerbaijan, a country which chose the priority of integration to West and NATO. In Caspian, rich oil resources belong to Azerbaijan and the country needs to have a strong military fleet to ensure their security," Mammadov said.



Azerbaijan has one of the naval forces in the Caspian, amongst former Soviet countries. In order to strengthen them, Azerbaijan needs to more actively co-operate with NATO and other members of the Alliance, according to Azeri military expert Uzeir Jafarov.



"The assistance that the U.S. currently renders Azerbaijan to strengthen the military-marine forces is a good support to the country. Azerbaijan should not be satisfied with it, but should expand its co-operation, not fearing from any reaction of Russia and Iran, who protest against militarization of the Caspian," Jafarov said.



In this regard, Azerbaijan may use assistance of Kazakhstan, which has already commenced strengthening the military forces in its section of Caspian with the help of the United States, the expert said.



The U.S. is willing to participate in construction of battle boats and infrastructure for Kazakh fleet, said Vice Admiral Kevin J. Cosgriff, Commander of the U.S. Naval Forces Central Command, Trend Azeri news agency reports.