Tel Aviv: Two major Israeli defence companies are competing on a major contract to supply border sensors to Azerbaijan. The total values of this contract will amount to US $ 1 billion. Israel will consider the sale of additional weapon systems to Azerbaijan after Armenia declared it is recognising the statehood of Palestine.
Armenia and Azerbaijan are engaged in a military confrontation concerning the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
In recent years, the tension between Azerbaijan and Armenia has gone up again and Baku has submitted a new shopping list to the Israeli ministry of defence. This list includes two Ofeq type high resolution spy satellites with less than 1 metre resolution.
The tension intensified when Armenia was asked to surrender eight rural enclaves that have been under Yerevan’s authority since the 1990s. This happens in parallel to high-level talks on a peace treaty between Baku and Yerevan initiated by Turkey and the USA.
Israeli sources say that Armenia has recently placed an order for Indian made Advanced Towed Artillery Gun System (ATAGS).
Israel is a major supplier of defence systems to Azerbaijan. These were heavily used in 202O when the conflict became a real military confrontation. Israel has very close defence ties with Baku. This fact is explained mainly by the long border shared by Azerbaijan and Iran. In recent years , there were reports that Israel uses Azerbaijan for collecting intelligence on Iran.
During the fighting between Azerbaijan and Armenia, Israeli weapon systems have been used on a wide scale by the Azeris. These included the Lora long range ground- ground missile made by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), the Harop heavy loitering weapon system also made by IAI and different types of loitering weapon system mainly those manufactured by Israeli company UVision. The Azeris want loitering weapon systems with bigger warheads.
Azerbaijan is operating the Barak MX air defence system made by IAI. Barak-MX is a modular air defence system and is designed to address missile and aircraft threats. It operates both in marine platforms and land, and belongs to the Barak missile family.
The BARAK MX system is capable of simple integration with any existing legacy or sensors. Earlier this year, Baku asked Israel for the Spy – X loitering weapon system made by Israeli company Blue Bird. The Spy X has a 50 km operational range, 1.5 hours mission time, autonomous electro-optical guided attack, optimal effect-on-target and tight integration with Bluebird’s VTOL ISR UAV family.
Baku recently requested a list of defence equipment from the Israeli Ministry of Defence. According to Israeli sources, this list also includes extremely sophisticated networked communication systems, EW systems, and more loitering weaponry, but with bigger warheads and anti-tank capabilities.
-The writer is an Israel-based freelance journalist. The views expressed are of the writer and do not necessarily reflect the views of Raksha Anirveda
