The ruling New Azerbaijan Party (NAP) begins to collect required signatures for candidates’ registration for the presidential post. “As known, the current President Ilham Aliyev’s candidature was confirmed at a meeting of the Central Election Commission (CEC) held on 7 August. After this, signature collecting campaign begins and nearly thousand people from the NAP have been chosen for this purpose. Training was held on this process to them,” Siyavush Novruzov, the deputy executive secretary of the NAP, told Trend News on 8 August.
The CEC has confirmed candidatures of six of them, including Ilham Aliyev, Igbal Agazade, Yashar Ahmadov, Vugar Seyidov, Alimukhtar Akbarov and Sevinj Guliyeva. Within ten days, candidates should collect 40,000 signatures of voters and submit them to the CEC.
According to Novruzov, the NAP will use new technologies during the elections. “Let me inform you that we have sent majority of our representatives to trainings to study experiences of different countries.

The United States wants Azerbaijan's opposition and other political forces to participate in the presidential elections on a broader scale, Terry Davidson, Head of the PR Department of the U.S. Embassy in Azerbaijan, said to journalists in Baku on 8 August.
According to Davidson, opposition’s participation in the elections will promote development of pluralism.
American diplomat said that anyway the United States respects several opposition parties’ decision not to participate in the elections.
Azadlig bloc, uniting three opposition parties (the Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan, the Liberal Party and the Citizen and Development Party), and the Classical Popular Front Party of Azerbaijan decided to boycott the presidential elections. The opposition Musavat, Civil Solidarity, Democratic and Great Establishment parties refused to participate in the elections with own candidates.

The funds allocated from the state budget will be included in the Elections Fund of the Azerbaijani presidential contenders, which is being formed at the moment.
“The amount of funds to be allocated to the presidential contenders will depend on the number of registered candidates. Therefore, it is impossible to specify the figure now,” Ramiz Ibrahimov, the head of the Financial Inspection Group at the Central Elections Commission (CEC) and a member of the CEC, said to journalists on 8 August.
AZN 21.7mln was allocated from the state budget for the presidential elections to be held on 15 October in 2008. This amount will be spent to the organization of the presidential elections, publication of required elections materials, transfers to the candidates’ Elections Fund, and other purposes.

The Azerbaijani National Broadcasting Council (NBC) will not supervise compliance of presidential candidates’ pre-elections propaganda campaign with the Law at the TV.
“The Central Elections Commission (CEC) will control the compliance of legislation during the elections period and only one part of this work will be connected with us. If they make decision on violation of the Law by any TV channel and appeal to us, we will make a decision on this TV channel,” Nushiravan Maharramli, the chairman of the NBC, told Trend News on 8 August.
Maharramli stated that control mechanism to hold pre-election campaign was granted to the group on the Media. “In other word, a group on the Media will be formed at the Central Elections Commission (CEC). This group may include representatives of different Media, the CEC and the CEC developed a separate instruction for this purpose. They will supervise propaganda campaign,” the chairman of the NBC said.
According to Maharramli, if the group on the Media finds out any violation of the law at the TV and if the CEC appeals to us on this matter, we will take relevant measures in respect of that TV channel.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev pays a special attention to the state policy on migration issues, to upgrade management system in this sphere, Fuad Alaskarov, the head of the Law-enforcement Department at the Azerbaijani Presidential Administration, told Trend News on 8 August. According to Alaskarov, President paid more attention to the issues to upgrade the state migration regulating system at the meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers dedicated to the results of social and economic development in the first half of 2008.
Attractiveness of frequent development of the economy in Azerbaijan, as well as stable political and economic situation, public and political order and security and the tolerance in the country influences the migration dynamic naturally.

Azerbaijani political scientists believe that Georgia will restore the control over the separatist South Ossetia through military ways.
“The recent events show that the official Tbilisi have seriously trained to war, it has strong army and Georgians will fight for their territorial integrity,” Vafa Guluzade, an independent political scientist, told Trend News on 8 August.
In the beginning of 1990, South Ossetia, having the status of autonomies within Georgia, proclaimed its independence with the support of Russia. A military conflict resulted in lost of control over the territories by official Tbilisi. The countries worldwide and international organizations have not recognized independence of South Ossetia. The peaceful negotiations for more than ten years have not yielded any results. In the early morning of 8 August, large-scale military operations commenced in the unrecognized South Ossetia Republic.

“Within ten days we will complete our work and present the final list to the President, and it is fully possible that a pardon order will be signed by the elections,” the member of the Commission on Pardon at the President of Azerbaijan, Vagif Samadoglu, told TrendNews after the meeting of the Commission.
The final pardon order in Azerbaijan was signed in March 2008, which was referred to 59 people.
Since 1995, 44 pardon orders have been signed. The 43 pardon order freed nearly 4,600 prisons.
Samadoglu said that the first meeting of the Commission considered nearly 50-60 applications. “In general, there are nearly 300 applications,” Samadoglu said, adding that currently jaiied three journalists can also be pardoned. “If they have appealed with regards to pardon, this issue will be considered surely. I believe that this issue will be positively resolved,” he said.

Armenia should be interested in peaceful solution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, or otherwise, Azerbaijan may re-establish its territorial integrity within international laws, official of Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry, Khazar Ibrahim, briefed the media in Baku.

The situation in Georgia can provoke further aggravation of relations in Caucasus, although Russia hardly will want to bring situation to the conflict.
“It is now difficult to say whether these actions will transform into large-scale war, but I do not exclude that the conflict will cover entire Caucasus,” said Director for Studies of the Central Asia- Caucasus Institute, Professor of John Hopkins University, Cornell told TrendNews.
In the early morning of 8 August, large-scale military operations commenced in the unrecognized South Ossetia Republic. Information was provided that the Georgian military people entered Tsinkhvali in the early morning. Official Tbilisi describes the events as “re-establishment of constitutional disciplines”. The unrecognized South Ossetia Republic asks Russia to provide military assistance.

The head of the public forum For Azerbaijan Eldar Namazov refused to participate in the presidential elections. He made the statement to Trend News on 8 August.
In 1993-1999, Namazov was the Head of Azerbaijan’s Presidential Secretariat.
In May, 2008, Namazov decided to participate in presidential elections, but now he re-considered his decision.

“This is all very frustrating. I make clear statements that are mistranslated. I then try to correct the record, and people claim I am changing my position”, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, OSCE MG CO-Chair told APA US bureau.
“I have no choice, but to correct the mistranslations. The easiest thing for me to do would be to stop talking to the press. But, if I did that, I would not be fulfilling my mission as Co-Chair”, he said.
I would never mention that there will be a "referendum" in Nagorno-Karabakh. What I said was, the Co-Chairs have proposed a balanced set of suggestions in the form of the Madrid Document, which includes elements such as redeployment of Armenian troops from the seven territories surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh, return of refugees and internally displaced persons, deployment of international peacekeepers, establishment of a corridor linking Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh, and perhaps a voting procedure of some sort in which the residents of Nagorno-Karabakh will play some role in determining Nagorno-Karabakh’s future status.

Chairman of the Umid Party (Hope Party) Igbal Agazadeh met with Claire Delessard, councilor of Peter Semneby on political issues, the Party’s press service told the APA. Claire Delessard took interest on several issues as current political situation in Azerbaijan, political parties and their function, Umid Party’s attitude towards elections and others. I. Agazade informed the councilor of political situation in the country and obstacles that the parties meet.

Editor-in-chief of Yeni Musavat newspaper Rauf Arifoglu said he would not participate in the presidential elections on October 15, APA reports. The editor-in-chief said in his statement that Musavat’s Party’s decision on not participating in the presidential elections was wrong and was a blow on the democratization movement. The editor-in-chief said his views that he was thinking over becoming presidential candidate was commented wrong.
“Besides, some persons, who feel hostility towards me and hired writers take the opportunity of the situation and libel. They also write that I fulfill special instructions of the authorities and will be presidential candidate to upset the opposition’s unanimous position on boycotting,” he said.

Chairman of the Modern Musavat Party Hafiz Hajiyev met with Jeff Benet, the councilor of US Ambassador on political issues, the parties press service told the APA. The parties discussed the current political situation in Azerbaijan and forthcoming presidential elections. Besides, the expansion of relations between diplomatic representations in Azerbaijan and oppositional parties, development of democracy, protection of human rights and some other issues were the focus of attention during the meeting.