Azerbaijan, Armenia and Masdar

Our neighbors are offended when we say that in Soviet times Armenia lived at the expense of other republics, and therefore, after gaining independence, it was left with nothing. Due to large subsidies, the standard of living in Armenia and two or three other Union republics was higher than in the whole country. Moscow has always had favorites. Some worked, while others enjoyed the benefits. Armenia has always been among the last. If the USSR had not collapsed, the former, in particular Azerbaijan, would have continued to pay for the construction of cities and the filling of shops with goods in this republic.

According to Soviet prices, by 1989 only Azerbaijan and Belarus had a positive balance in the foreign trade of the Soviet Union. In the Russian Federation, imports exceeded exports. When converted to world market prices, only the RSFSR and Azerbaijan had a positive balance. That is, our republic sold more than it bought, both at Soviet and world prices. Azerbaijan worked, Armenia consumed. As part of the empire, Armenia was a favorite and was allowed to do everything, including keep records only in Armenian, which even the Balts could not dream of.

The fact that Azerbaijan received less from the center than it gave away, of course, was unfair. But it taught him not to depend on anyone. The experience proved useful, and after the restoration of independence, Azerbaijan did not stop, but fell into a long-lasting crisis. If it hadn't been for the Armenian aggression and the internal political chaos, the launch would have been much more effective. When the chaos was stopped by Heydar Aliyev, who returned to power, Azerbaijan began to recover quite quickly. It turned out that unlike many of his former "brothers", he is capable of successful autonomous navigation.

These thoughts were prompted by a post published in one of the Armenian Telegram channels. Against the background of the meetings taking place in Abu Dhabi, the channel's author wondered why Armenia's cooperation with the Emirati Masdar stands still, while Azerbaijan implements one project after another with this company.

Armenia signed a contract with the Emirati company in 2021, just a year later than Azerbaijan. But so far, not a single project has been implemented, from which the author of the post concluded that the reason for this is the inability to implement large investment projects.

With Masdar, Armenia is going to implement a 200 MW project of an industrial-scale photovoltaic solar power plant "Ayg-1". The process has dragged on for five years, and construction is finally due to begin this year. The case was slowed down due to the confusion with equity participation. The Armenian ANIF Fund, founded by the state in 2019 to attract foreign investment in partnership with the private sector, was supposed to own 15 percent of the SES, but fell for violations and was closed in 2024. In five years, the project has gone through the liquidation of this fund, protracted land disputes and court proceedings.

Meanwhile, Azerbaijan has implemented more than one project in partnership with Masdar. The two countries demonstrate the same approaches to cooperation. The company came to Azerbaijan in February 2020, when a cooperation agreement was signed between the Ministry of Energy of the Republic of Azerbaijan and Masdar.

On October 26, 2923, the Garadagh solar power plant built by Masdar with a capacity of 230 MW was launched, which became the largest solar power plant in the South Caucasus and is capable of providing electricity to 110,000 apartments, that is, in fact, the whole city. During the opening ceremony, Masdar signed three investment agreements with the Azerbaijani side in the field of green energy with a total capacity of 1,000 MW. These include a solar power plant in the village of Gunesh in the Bilasuvar district, a 315 MW solar power plant in the village of Bank in the Neftchala district, as well as a 240 MW wind power plant in the Absheron and Garadagh districts. It is planned that the annual electricity generation of the SES "Bilasuvar" will amount to 890 million kilowatt-hours, and the SES "Neftchala" 640 million kilowatt-hours. The SES in Bilasuvar and Neftchala will be able to provide electricity to more than 135,000 homes and avoid the emission of over 730,000 tons of CO? per year.

These three agreements represent the initial stage of the Executive Agreements concluded by Azerbaijan with Masdar in June 2022 regarding the implementation of megaprojects in the field of renewable energy sources with a capacity of 4 GW.

Construction of a 445 MW Bilasuvar solar power plant (Bilasuvar Solar SPV) began in August 2025. When ready, it will become the largest in the South Caucasus. In the meantime, Garadagh SES retains this status. Masdar intends to complete the project by 2027, and the solar panels for it are supplied by China Energy Development.

Baku considers Abu Dhabi as one of its key partners in the Middle East. The main part of these relations is partnership on renewable energy projects, but in general, the countries' cooperation is broader. Azerbaijan not only consumes investments and services, it has something to offer its partner. This is exactly what Armenia has big problems with - it has nothing to offer and it is very difficult to be an equal partner. Its international position is practically nonexistent, its real economic opportunities and investment attractiveness are very low. Large foreign companies are only now beginning to carefully look at the Armenian market. The most important thing is the inability to be independent. To implement large-scale projects, it is not enough just to sign a contract with a foreign company. The skills of business activity in the traditional Armenian sense turned out to be useless in the conditions of free swimming. Armenia has never been able to count on itself when no one will do anything for you and no one will pay for you. 

The Armenian blogger is absolutely right: Azerbaijan knows how to implement large-scale projects. Let's add that he is able to do this even without the presence of large partners and investments. This is how the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway corridor project was implemented. In cooperation with global companies, the Main BTC export oil pipeline and the grandiose Southern Gas Corridor were built.

By the way, during the current visit of Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to Abu Dhabi, a document was signed regarding the agreement on the sale to the investment division of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company - XRG of a part of the Ministry of Economy's non-controlling interest in the Southern Gas Corridor CJSC. Thus, the UAE will become an equity participant in SGC.

It is also worth recalling that on January 8, the official opening of the 240 MW Khizi-Absheron wind farm, built by another Middle Eastern partner of Azerbaijan, the Saudi company ACWA Power, took place.

In conclusion, we should note that our neighbors often, especially in the old days, had to hear the following: Baku, the oil industry and the industry of Azerbaijan as a whole, in general, were all created by Armenians here. When you hear this, a perfectly legitimate question arises: why didn't they do the same in Armenia, in their own republic? Why wasn't anything built or developed there either during the Soviet era or after independence? In theory, if Azerbaijan (like the rest of the world) owes all its successes to the Armenians, then Armenia itself should be ahead of Singapore today. Why is this not happening?

This is not a rhetorical question.