Novruz Mammadov questions authenticity of documents published by WikiLeaks

Some of the information included in the documents published by WikiLeaks is surprising, Novruz Mammadov, the Head of the Department of International Affairs of Azerbaijan's presidential administration, has told Azerbaijani news agency 1news.az.

"Recently the website WikiLeaks started to disseminate a series of information. I would not like to speak about their significance at the moment. But part of the information found there is surprising for me. It does surprise me because it includes some ideas allegedly pronounced by Azerbaijan's president during his meetings," Mammadov was quoted as saying.

It comes after WikiLeaks published documents that disclosed some details of an alleged meeting between Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Bill Burns where Aliyev speaks about the Nagorno Karabakh peace talks, Azerbaijani-Turkish relations, as well as about the political conjuncture in Russia.

Speaking about the relations between Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin Mr Aliyev had reportedly said that the two leaders are spoiling for a fight.

"We have a saying in Azer: 'Two heads cannot be boiled in one pot' (crude street slang suggesting that two leaders are spoiling for a fight- WikiLeaks,)" Aliyev was reported as saying.

Mammadov said that he has taken part also in that meeting and insisted that Aliyev did not speak about other states and did not discuss issues other than the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and US-Azerbaijani relations.

"I have taken part also in the meeting by President Ilham Aliyev and US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Bill Burns. I would like to mention that the meeting dealt specifically with two issues, i.e. two issues were discussed. The first was the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement. The second was the development of bilateral ties between Azerbaijan and USA. I want to inform you that in all the meetings by Azerbaijan's president the head of the Azerbaijani state speaks about Azerbaijan's relations with the given party. During such meeting Azerbaijan's president does not speak about a third country or state. The above-mentioned meeting with Bill Burns also took place that way. That is to say, it took place as I said: nothing was said about any state except the two above-mentioned issues," he was quoted as saying.

Interestingly, minutes after its publication on the Azerbaijani news website APA, the Russian version of this news item was removed. Only the Azerbaijani variant could be reached.

However, it is still available on the Azerbaijani news website www.1news.az.