Azerbaijan—at the boundary of Eastern Europe and West Asia—has a long-running dispute with France, but has no history or strategic interest in the Pacific.
Yet it has been accused of pouring fuel onto the fire of independence movements in French territories across the region.
Is it just anti-French animus, or is someone else adding sparks to the fire?
The idea that the recent uprising in New Caledonia—which has seen cars and buildings burned, roadblocks across the capital Nouméa, and six deaths to date—is being fuelled by anything other than the ongoing struggle of native Kanak people for independence from France may seem to belong in the shadowy corner of the internet reserved for conspiracy theories.
But senior French government figures are advancing the idea that strategists in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, are masterminding events in the Pacific from thousands of kilometres away and that they’re not the only ones doing so.
France’s Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin has publicly accused the Eurasian nation of interfering in New Caledonia’s internal matters.
“This isn’t a fantasy. It’s a reality,” he told the France 2 TV channel.
“I regret that some of the separatists have made a deal with Azerbaijan,” he said.
However, “even if there are attempts at interference … France is sovereign on its own territory, and so much the better.”
Social media accounts which openly support Azerbaijan in the conflict with Armenia have been observed spreading misleading content about French police actions in New Caledonia, aimed at inciting unrest and violence.
Similar accounts have also been accused of running a disinformation campaign about France’s capability to host the Olympic Games, due to start on July 26 in Paris.
In April, France recalled its ambassador to Azerbaijan—one of the most serious of diplomatic rebukes—with President Macron saying he hoped Baku would clarify its intentions.
But instead, in the same month, Azerbaijan signed a memorandum of cooperation with separatist elements in New Caledonia.
Links to Pro-Independence Movements Across French Territories
France faces increasingly strident calls for independence from many of its colonies, including New Caledonia, French Polynesia, French Guiana, Martinique, Guadeloupe, and Corsica which have banded together to press for an end to colonialism.Uniting the disparate rebel groups is an organisation about which relatively little is known, called the Baku Initiative Group. Baku is Azerbaijan’s capital.
Established in July 2023, the Group—comprised mainly of participants from French territories seeking independence—aims to support anti-colonial movements against France.
There is no detail on who funds the group, its lavish conferences, or the salary of its executive director, Abbas Abbasov.
Mr. Abbasov was previously a senior oil company executive and a former First Deputy Prime Minister of his country.
However, according to Philippe Gomes, former president of the government of New Caledonia, Azerbaijan is actively funding the pro-independence Kanak and Socialist National Liberation Front (FLNKS) and “created the Baku Group through which it funds separatists in all overseas French regions.
“Recent trips to Paris by independence activists were funded by Baku. It is clear and obvious that Azerbaijan is contributing in support the request for independence, which can be called foreign interference,” Mr. Gomes alleged.
Other nation’s representatives have also expressed concerns at the prospect—if substantiated—of outside forces playing a hand in the South Pacific.
“I think it’s clear that all over the world, we see countries who have different agendas—from ours or Australia—trying to influence information streams that reach the general audience, and that obviously influences the political positions taken,” said Dutch Ambassador to Australia Ardi Stoios-Braken in response to The Epoch Times.
“We would hope for a situation where countries can decide—in a sovereign manner—how they go about their business, and not because they are pressured or due to information that is not correct,” she told the Australian Institute of International Affairs in Brisbane.
“If that is the reason why this has gotten out of hand, that is a very worrying development.”
Azerbaijani Flags at Nouméa Protests
And it’s true that, while many people would struggle to identify what one looked like, Azerbaijani flags have been on display at Kanak independence protests.The Group has expressed solidarity with the Kanak people and condemned the electoral reforms which led to the recent riots.
An analysis by French state radio found that 90 percent of the Baku Group’s output on social networks concerned French overseas territories.
Mr. Abbasov told French media that the Group had “not prepared anything. Our colleagues who work with NGOs have been told: ‘We have raised your flag in our demonstrations on our sole initiative.’”
However, images from French TV show protesters wearing t-shirts displaying anti-colonial slogans and the Baku Group’s logo.
The page also reposted an article by Francis Carole, a member of the Martinique Assembly and the Baku Initiative, refuting any suggestion of foreign influence on the movement for New Caledonian liberation.
“The foreigner’s hand and ‘interference’ are always an easy parade to mask one’s own mediocrity, justify arbitrary decisions and try to discredit those who dare challenge the colonial order,” Mr. Carole wrote.
“The fact is that the Kanak people did not wait for anyone to, from 1853, the year of the occupation of their territory by the French, rise up multiple times, without political subordination to anyone, neither to foreign powers nor to unlikely philanthropists descended from heaven.
“[It is] the responsibility of a liberation movement to seek the international support it needs, as long as it remains the absolute master of its own struggle.”
The Epoch Times has contacted Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade who could not provide a response before publication deadline.
Azerbaijan Denies Involvement
For its part, Azerbaijan denies any involvement in New Caledonia’s troubles.“We completely reject the baseless accusations,” said Ayhan Hajizadeh, a spokesperson for Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry. “We refute any connection between the leaders of the struggle for freedom in Caledonia and Azerbaijan.”
But that’s refuted by no less an authority than Roch Wamytan, the FLNKS president of New Caledonia’s Congress, who told Radio France: “Azerbaijan, in its speech in defence of international law, is a lever for building an international network for us. We are forced to turn to external countries to call for help.”
Analysts suggest that Azerbaijan’s motive is simply to highlight what it sees as French hypocrisy: how can France accuse Azerbaijan of occupying the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh (linked to Armenia), while it occupies New Caledonia?
But while Beijing and Moscow are known to have extraterritorial ambitions and to run active destabilisation efforts against the West, the authoritarian Muslim nation is not similarly known.
What Other Influences Could Be at Work?
New Caledonia is of considerable economic and strategic importance.It is the world’s third-largest producer of nickel, a mineral that is vital to everything from the production of stainless steel, to rechargeable batteries for electric vehicles, and other end uses.
About a quarter of the island’s 275,000 population is employed in the nickel industry.
Its position in the Pacific, 1,210 kilometres (750 miles) east of Australia, and 1,402 kilometres (871 miles) north of New Zealand, also makes it strategically valuable. It is actually closer to both nations compared to Tonga, Samoa, and Fiji.
There would be obvious advantages to both Beijing and Moscow in having the country run by a local authority which would likely have to rely on a foreign power to keep it afloat.
France has a military base on the island, which last December hosted the South Pacific defence ministers’ conference, attended by Sébastien Lecornu, France’s minister for armed forces.
If France were to withdraw, a new Kanak government may be convinced to invite another country to step in.
Certainly, Beijing, which is rapidly expanding its electric vehicle production, would like to gain preferential access to New Caledonia’s nickel reserves and a foothold off the coast of two Western nations whose involvement (prospective, in the case of New Zealand) in AUKUS is causing the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) considerable concern.
The Sino-Caledonian Friendship Association is financed by the CCP, and the country’s president, Ilham Aliyev, is on good terms with CCP leader Xi Jinping.
In February, Mr. Xi sent Mr. Aliyev a message congratulating him on his re-election, expressing their “high level of political mutual trust.”
Yet it would also hint at why New Caledonian authorities banned Chinese music app TikTok during the riots.
While Beijing’s motives are fairly obvious, Moscow’s are more opaque.
In contrast, President Macron has been one of the most outspoken critics of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in recent weeks, saying that there were “no limits” to French support for Kyiv and urging others not to be “cowardly.”
The African continent’s natural resources, its 54 votes at the U.N. General Assembly, and its relative proximity to Europe would provide Russia with a valuable ally and a strategic location allowing it to virtually encircle Western Europe.
While winning over the local population with propaganda, including the state-owned RT television channel, there are reports of an ever-increasing number of abuses by local armed forces and their Russian auxiliaries, including executions, disappearances of civilians, looting and torture.
While New Caledonia’s mineral resources may be attractive to Moscow, the country would not be as much of a geopolitical jewel as it would be for Beijing, though France’s withdrawal from the Pacific would certainly further its strategy of global destabilisation against the West.
It could be that Mr. Putin’s strategy for encouraging Azerbaijan-backed interference is simply to have France distracted from standing up to Russia in Africa by dealing with troubles in its territories—troubles that the Baku Initiative Group may well be planning to spread to other parts of the French-ruled world.
It seems that would not be unwelcome in New Caledonia at least.
Protesters there have waved a banner welcoming Mr. Putin and another, even more explicit, said: “President Putin, free our colonies.”
