The summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), the second-largest organization after the UN for the number of participants, has been held in Europe since 1989.

Axar.az reports that Russian political analyst, founder, and head of the PolitRUS expert and analytical network Vitaly Arkov told Trend.

“Organization of this event in Baku is Azerbaijan’s significant diplomatic victory, which shows the country’s ever-increasing role in the international arena,” the analyst said.

“It is also important that the NAM youth summit was held in Baku for the first time in the history of such a respected and influential organization,” Arkov added.

“This increases the interest of “generation Z” representatives in solving the NAM tasks, and opens up a new vision and new options to restart the stalled negotiation processes on a number of territorial and interethnic conflicts,” the analyst said, adding that Armenia-Azerbaijan Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is one of such problems.

Turkish political analyst, the leading representative of the Ankara-Moscow expert and analytical network Engin Ozer, for his part, told Trend that NAM is today one of the strongest and most influential organizations.

“Moreover, none of the African countries is a NATO member but almost all African countries are part of the NAM,” the political analyst said.

Ozer also stressed that today Azerbaijan is the most strategically important actor in the region.

“Azerbaijan’s policy towards such blocs as the CSTO and NATO is the most effective one in the region,” the Turkish political analyst said.“Azerbaijan may simultaneously strengthen partnership in all spheres with Russia and the West, as well as with Turkey thanks to the Azerbaijani president’s competent policy. As a result, Azerbaijan proves itself more as a regional leader.”

Ozer said that the NAM summit is certainly a good occasion and an opportunity to raise the issue of stability in the Caucasus and the return of the occupied territories to Azerbaijan.

Further, head of the Baku Club of Political Analysts Zaur Mammadov
pointed out that Azerbaijan has a very good image, political and international status on all platforms and in all international organizations.

“Although Azerbaijan became a NAM member in 2011, the chairmanship passed to the country in 2019, Mammadov added.

“The history of Azerbaijan’s joining this organization is also interesting,” head of the Baku Club of Political Analysts said. “All post-Soviet countries faced the issue of integration in the western or northern direction in 2011. We know that Armenia is a CSTO member. Georgia seeks to join NATO.”

“But membership in the NAM was Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s most reasonable and rational decision to save the country from the risks faced by Azerbaijan’s statehood taking into account that the world players have their interests in the region,” Mammadov added. “The NAM meets Azerbaijan’s current national and state interests.”

The head of the Baku Club of Political Analysts said that after Azerbaijan joined the NAM, Armenia began to actively consider this sphere in its foreign policy.

The 18th Summit of the NAM was held in Baku on Oct.25-26. The heads of state and government of about 60 countries, as well as the heads of international organizations, participated in the summit.

NAM is the second biggest organization in the world after the UN. Today, approximately 55 percent of the world population lives in the NAM member-states, which have more than 75 percent of the world's oil reserves and more than 50 percent of gas reserves, as well as the biggest natural and human resources.