Azerbaijan and Russia Now Trading Raids on Ex-Pat Communities

Well. This is heating up quickly.

Russia can’t seem to keep its hands off anyone. But with Russian regional elections coming up in September of 2025, the war in Ukraine not going so swimmingly even as it’s still going, and the Russian economy sputtering…

Russia’s economy faces a tough 2026, the head of the country’s biggest bank has said in the latest official warning about the country’s finances, which is at odds with Vladimir Putin’s rosier public pronouncements.

German Gref, CEO and chairman of the executive board of Sberbank, said a spike in inflation and the high key interest rate were problems that could not be solved quickly. His comments come only days after Russian Central Bank Governor Elvira Nabiullina and economy minister Maxim Reshetnikov issued their own warnings about wartime growth.

This is despite Putin dismissing concerns about Russia’s economy which he insisted remained strong despite sanctions and war.

Even in an authoritarian country like Russia, there is freedom in economic policy debates, Vasily Astrov, an expert on Russia’s economy told Newsweek on Tuesday, but each official will make statements that reflect the interests of their groups.

…Vladimir Putin is trying to put his best face forward everywhere, so he will emerge victorious.

As he is not a man to half-step when it comes to crushing opposing views or rooting out dissidents wherever they may come from, Putin has also been zeroing in on the myriad ethnic communities that fill Russia’s wildly diverse population. 

One of those is known as the Azerbaijani diaspora, and the Russians have a large and well-established chunk of it. This group of about 600K or so ethnic Azeris started settling in Russia in the late 1800s, but it really picked up after World War II (they say there are some 5-10M Azeris living worldwide).  They’ve integrated into Russian society but maintained their cultural heritage, traditions, and identity as an ethnic community.

On June 27, the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) in Yekaterinburg arrested 50 Azeris under the pretext of investigating several decades-old crimes and murders. It ended badly.

They sent them off to Ukraine as conscripts after torturing and beating them.

On June 27, in Yekaterinburg, Russian security forces detained more than 50 Azerbaijanis. The detainees were beaten and tortured to force them to sign contracts and go to war against Ukraine. Two people died, and two others were seriously injured.

Azerbaijan demands that those responsible be held accountable.

Russia, however, is behaving as if nothing happened. The foreign ministry of the aggressor country stated that the detentions were carried out as part of a criminal case concerning organized crime and murders committed in 2001, 2010, and 2011.

As is typical for Russians, they just shrugged at the Azeris’ outrage and thought no more about it.

CRIMINALS GET SENT TO THE FRONT

In retaliation, the Azerbaijan government, back in Baku, their capital, ordered their forces yesterday to raid the offices of Sputnik, the Russian state news agency there.

The Azeri state news station ran a blistering anti-Putin screed.

🚨🇷🇺🇦🇿 Azerbaijan RAIDS Sputnik’s Baku office, ARRESTING several employees.

Tensions with Russia are BOILING.

State TV openly DECLARES: “Mr. Putin, this isn’t 1937.”

Footage from Azerbaijan’s Capital Baku Showing the Arrests of the Russian Agents.#Azerbaijan #Russia #Putin pic.twitter.com/GDu2Pk3UjP

— TIger NS (@TIgerNS3) June 30, 2025

And the interior ministry took it upon themselves to go look for criminals of the Russian persuasion, which they did manage to find. And then put on a fine display of frogmarching all the Russian journalists and FSB agents, some of whom had suspiciously fat lips and what looked like shiners.

Stairs are probably steep in Baku and door knobs very large.

The situation is escalating: The Azerbaijani Interior Ministry detained Russian citizens in Baku who were members of two organized crime groups. They were engaged in drug transit from Iran, their online realization, and cybercrime. pic.twitter.com/uD0luO7xaj

— Romeo-Alpha-X (@RufatAbas) July 1, 2025

Tit for criminal tat.

Putin one-upped everyone today with targeted raids on the apparently well-established mafioso-type Azeri market moguls, rounding them up by the gross. His FSB even hauled in who are apparently some pretty well-known characters.

Russians don’t mess around when they come for you.

Tensions between Russia and Azerbaijan escalate.

Russian security forces in Yekaterinburg detained Shahin Shykhlinsky, head of the “Azerbaijan-Ural” organization, near the Baku Plaza shopping center, a hub for the Azerbaijani diaspora.

His driver was also arrested.

Earlier,… pic.twitter.com/VFG2sefafX

— Vanguard Intel Group 🛡 (@vanguardintel) July 1, 2025

They even brought scaling ladders.

Footage of the arrest of two prominent Azerbaijanis at once. In Voronezh, Yusif Khalilov, co-owner of the Alekseevsky market, was arrested, and in Yekaterinburg, Shahin Shykhlinski, leader of the organization “Azerbaijan-Ural”. As many publications report, both defendants are… pic.twitter.com/78GcZkXibY

— The world is patriots.🇺🇸🇷🇺 (@bertalanzoli) July 1, 2025

So…why? Like Putin doesn’t have enough trouble, right?

One explanation is that he is using the pretext of the criminal activity to control elements in the diaspora he sees as a threat to his retaining control during the upcoming elections. Putin doesn’t trust them not to work against him, and he’s laying down his marker with these raids now, as well as reasserting control over his internal security forces.

• The arrested individuals in Yekaterinburg were allegedly linked to rival factions within the FSB or acted outside Moscow’s direct control, using their connections within the Azerbaijani diaspora to run unauthorized surveillance, protection rackets, or smuggling operations.
• This suggests that the raids may have been part of a power struggle inside Russian security services, aimed at reasserting central control over intelligence operatives with diaspora ties.

And for all his apparent indifference, Putin is very concerned about Erdogan’s influence in the region.

• With regional elections approaching and growing nationalist sentiment inside Russia, the Kremlin may be trying to tighten control over large ethnic minority diasporas like the Azerbaijanis, Uzbeks, and Chechens.
• Yekaterinburg, being a diverse and economically vital city, has seen periodic ethnic tensions, and the raids may serve as a signal to deter unrest or dissent.

5. Anti-Turkic Sentiment and Pan-Turkic Fears

Key Cause: Suspicion of Turkish Influence

• As Azerbaijan deepens its ties with Turkey and the Organization of Turkic States, Russian officials increasingly fear that pan-Turkic ideas are spreading within their own Turkic-speaking populations (Tatars, Bashkirs, etc.).
• Yekaterinburg, with its central location and large migrant communities, may be seen as a hotspot for ideological influence from Baku or Ankara.

For its part, Azerbaijan is not going quietly into that good night and taking this lying down.

Their state TV recently broadcast an exposé on the Ukraine war and the state of Russia’s defenses that probably had Putin’s head exploding at the thought of it being seen anywhere in Russia. The piece would totally blow his carefully crafted state narrative.

‼️‼️‼️🇦🇿 BIG NEWS – Amid rising tensions between Baku and Moscow in recent days, the Azerbaijani state-run television channel AZTV aired a report highlighting the Russian army’s failures in the war in Ukraine — stating that due to depleted manpower, Russia is now massively… pic.twitter.com/FcPNdBhE66

— Visioner (@visionergeo) July 1, 2025

Putin’s heavy-handed response could well have the opposite effect from what he’d normally expect.

…The dual crises in Yekaterinburg and Baku mark more than isolated incidents; they signal a strategic recalibration in Azerbaijan’s approach to Russia. As Baku asserts control over its information environment and diaspora ties, and as Moscow reacts with suspicion and resentment, a new phase of limited, distrustful coexistence is likely to emerge. The long-term effect may be a regional power balance tilted more heavily toward Turkey, with Moscow scrambling to retain relevance in a region it once dominated.

Anything that improves Erdogan’s position is not optimal, either, from our vantage point.

Not to mention, the Armenians are also part of this mix, but that’s another post.

Lovely.