Azerbaijan

Abstract

The Azerbaijan Republic (Azerbaycan Respublikasi) is located in the south-eastern area of the Caucasus, bordering the Caspian Sea, the Russian Federation, and Georgia in the north, Armenia and Turkey in the west, and Iran in the south. The capital and largest city is Baku. More than 50% of the population live in urban areas. The territory of Azerbaijan covers 86,600 sq. km, including the exclave of the Naxcivan Autonomous Republic and the enclave Nagorno-Karabakh, which is largely populated by Armenians. Since 1988-89 Azerbaijan and Armenia have been in conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, which the Armenian military occupied, thus depriving Azerbaijan of nearly 20% of its territory and creating almost 800,000 refugees and displaced people, which is 10% of the country’s population. A permanent peace agreement has still not been concluded between Azerbaijan and Armenia. Azerbaijan has 8,000,000 inhabitants and a majority Turkic Shiite Muslim population (Azeri 90%). Other resident ethnic groups are Dagestani (3.2%), Russian (2.5%), Armenian (2%), and others such as Lezghins and Kurds (2.3%) (cf. CIA 2005). Like most countries in transition, Azerbaijan is facing serious economic problems; the majority of the population has a low level of income and poor living conditions. The official language is Azeri, which belongs to the Western Turkic languages. During its history, the country was ruled by Persians, Arabs, Ottomans, and Russians. As a consequence, the Azeri language was first written in Arabic; in 1924 a modified Roman alphabet was gradually introduced. Later, in the 1930s, Soviet authorities promoted the use of the Cyrillic alphabet. For nearly seventy years Azerbaijan was part of the Soviet Union, but in 1991 it declared its independence. After independence, a gradual return to the Roman alphabet was decided upon (cf. Library Congress Country Studies 1994). Hörner et al. (eds.), The Education Systems of Europe, 77–84.