Azerbaijan
Military: Azerbaijan
Military branches:
Army, Navy, Air, and Air Defense Forces (2010)
Military service age and obligation:
men between 18 and 35 are liable for military service; length of service is 18 months and 12 months for university graduates; 17 years of age for voluntary service; 17 year olds are considered to be on active service at cadet military schools (2012)
Manpower available for military service:
males age 16-49: 2,354,249
females age 16-49: 2,334,632 (2010 est.)
Manpower fit for military service:
males age 16-49: 1,773,993
females age 16-49: 1,964,012 (2010 est.)
Manpower reaching militarily significant age annually:
male: 76,923
female: 71,024 (2010 est.)
Military expenditures:
country comparison to the world: 51
Transnational Issues: Azerbaijan
Disputes - international:
Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Russia ratified the Caspian seabed delimitation treaties based on equidistance, while Iran continues to insist on a one-fifth slice of the sea; the dispute over the break-away Nagorno-Karabakh region and the Armenian military occupation of surrounding lands in Azerbaijan remains the primary focus of regional instability; residents have evacuated the former Soviet-era small ethnic enclaves in Armenia and Azerbaijan; local border forces struggle to control the illegal transit of goods and people across the porous, undemarcated Armenian, Azerbaijani, and Georgian borders; bilateral talks continue with Turkmenistan on dividing the seabed and contested oilfields in the middle of the Caspian
Refugees and internally displaced persons:
IDPs: 600,000 (conflict with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh) (2013)
Illicit drugs:
limited illicit cultivation of cannabis and opium poppy, mostly for CIS consumption; small government eradication program; transit point for Southwest Asian opiates bound for Russia and to a lesser extent the rest of Europe