Military Azerbaijan
Military branches:
Army, Navy, Air and Air Defense Forces
Military service age and obligation: men between 18 and 35 are liable for military service; 18 years of age for voluntary military service; length of military service is 18 months and 12 months for university graduates (2006)
Manpower available for military service:
males age 18-49: 1,961,973
females age 18-49: 2,033,186 (2005 est.)
Manpower fit for military service:
males age 18-49: 1,314,955
females age 18-49: 1,676,408 (2005 est.)
Manpower reaching military service age annually:
males age 18-49: 82,358
females age 18-49: 78,067 (2005 est.)
Military expenditures - dollar figure:
$121 million (FY99)
Military expenditures - percent of GDP:
2.6% (FY99)
Transnational Issues Azerbaijan
Disputes - international:
Armenia supports ethnic Armenian secessionists in Nagorno-Karabakh
and since the early 1990s has militarily occupied 16% of Azerbaijan;
over 800,000 mostly ethnic Azerbaijanis were driven from the
occupied lands and Armenia; about 230,000 ethnic Armenians were
driven from their homes in Azerbaijan into Armenia; Azerbaijan seeks
transit route through Armenia to connect to Naxcivan exclave;
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) continues
to mediate dispute; Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Russia ratify
Caspian seabed delimitation treaties based on equidistance, while
Iran continues to insist on an even one-fifth allocation and
challenges Azerbaijan's hydrocarbon exploration in disputed waters;
bilateral talks continue with Turkmenistan on dividing the seabed
and contested oilfields in the middle of the Caspian; Azerbaijan and
Georgia continue to discuss the alignment of their boundary at
certain crossing areas