Showing posts with label Croatia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Croatia. Show all posts

Sunday 28 May 2023

Israeli President’s visit to Azerbaijan

President Isaac Herzog will travel to Azerbaijan on Tuesday to strengthen the strategic ties between Israel and the Shia Muslim country bordering on Iran.

During the two-day visit, Herzog plans to meet with his Azeri counterpart Ilham Aliyev and to take part in a special event marking the 75th anniversary of Israeli independence.

Aliyev will welcome Herzog and his wife, Michal, at his palace, with an honor guard, and the two presidents plan to hold a diplomatic meeting, followed by a lunch.

Health and Interior Minister Moshe Arbel will accompany Herzog to Azerbaijan, where he plans to meet with his counterparts in Baku to discuss greater cooperation in training doctors, emergency preparedness and digital health.

Israel and Azerbaijan are expected to sign an agreement on health cooperation during the visit.

The Herzogs will also meet with members of the Jewish community in Azerbaijan. They are expected to be met at the airport by 30 children who attend the Chabad School in Baku, waving the flags of Israel and Azerbaijan.

Azerbaijan opened an embassy in Israel for the first time in March of this year, though Israel has had an embassy in Baku since 1993.

Baku had been hesitant to open an embassy in Israel in the past for fear of alienating other Muslim-majority states or provoking Iran but saw the Abraham Accords and Israel's rapprochement with Turkey, in which Aliyev played a part, as turning points.

Israel and Azerbaijan have a close defense relationship. Jerusalem supplied drones to Baku that were used in its 2020 war with Armenia, according to foreign reports.

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute found that 69% of Azerbaijan’s arms imports in 2016-2020 came from Israel, which represents 17% of Israel’s arms exports in that period.

About 40% of the petroleum imported to Israel comes from Azerbaijan.

Azeri politicians tied the move to open an embassy in Israel to Iran opening an additional consulate and declaring close ties with Armenia, with which Azerbaijan fought a war in 2020.

Iran and Azerbaijan share a 670-kilometer border, and there has long been speculation that Israel has launched covert operations in Iran from its northern neighbor.

Last year, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian accused Israel of having established its presence in several regions of Azerbaijan, which Baku denied.

Soon after, Iran staged a military drill along the border. Aliyev responded by having himself photographed with Israeli Harop kamikaze drones, which are produced in his country.

Also this week, Foreign Minister Eli Cohen will be making a diplomatic trip to Central Europe to meet with senior government figures in Croatia, Slovakia, Hungary, and Austria. He plans to visit four countries and meet with five foreign ministers in four days.

He will be the first Israeli foreign minister to visit Slovakia and the first in 10 years to go to Zagreb.

“The diplomatic visit to Central Europe strengthens our strategic coordination with our allies and creates opportunities for Israel to promote its diplomatic and economic interests on the continent,” Cohen said. “Israel’s allies in the EU play an important role…from economic, cultural and technological cooperation, to our joint fight against terror and a nuclear Iran.”

 

Wednesday 26 January 2022

US succeeds in selling Bradley fighting vehicles to Croatia

According to a report, Croatia will buy 89 US Bradley fighting vehicles as part of a plan to form an infantry brigade to aid NATO, Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic announced Wednesday. 

Croatia will receive 62 fully equipped and armed versions of the armored vehicles plus another 22 for reserve parts and five for training in a US$196 million deal, Plenkovic announced on Twitter. 

As part of the agreement, Croatia will pay slightly more than US$145 million while the United States will cover US$51 million. 

“This is a confirmation of good cooperation and I believe that in this way, we have added another piece to the mosaic of our cooperation,” Plenkovic told reporters, according to The Associated Press. “The Croatian army will achieve a new level of quality.” 

Croatia, which has been negotiating the vehicle deal since 2017, currently uses Bradley models from as far back as Operation Desert Storm in the early 1990s and wants to upgrade the machine guns, missiles, radios and armor, among other parts.  

Plenkovic said the new vehicles will begin arriving in 2023. 

A member of NATO, Croatia looks to bolster its military equipment to keep up with its neighbor and Russian ally Serbia. The country also must contend with an increasingly aggressive Kremlin, though its president said Tuesday that it would not be sending troops if tensions between Russia and Ukraine continue to escalate.