MP blames Armenian lobby for anti-Azeri bias

"The positions of Azerbaijan and Armenia in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) are not the same. There is some favoritism within the organization. There is even religious discrimination," a member of the Azerbaijan delegation to PACE, MP Gultakin Hajiyeva has told AssA-Irada.

"The Armenian lobby in France is very powerful. This lobby is also capable of influencing the Council of Europe too. From this standpoint, it is not surprising at all that the attitude to Azerbaijan is slightly different," she said.

The MP said further that the positions of rapporteurs on Azerbaijan and Armenia were playing a major role in this.

"It would safe to describe the rapporteurs on Armenia as friends of that country because these people are trying to hush up the drawbacks they discover in Armenia and to portray it as a democratic country. At the same time, the rapporteurs on Azerbaijan not only blow our imperfections out of proportion, but they also don’t want to recognize our successes," Hajiyeva said and revealed a way of fighting such double standards.

"To prevent this from happening, we need to treat our own responsibilities more seriously. We understand what forces confront us and who stands behind them. We are fully aware of the bias against us."