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AZERBAIJAN Bayram Balci1 and Altay Goyushov2 1 Muslim

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AZERBAIJAN Bayram Balci1 and Altay Goyushov2 1 Muslim AZERBAIJAN Bayram Balci1 and Altay Goyushov2 1 Muslim Populations Azerbaijan is a secular country with an overwhelmingly ethnic Muslim population. Roughly 96%3 of Azerbaijan’s 9.1 million4 inhabitants are estimated to have a Muslim background. A large majority is still strongly attached to their Islamic identity and considers it as an inextricable part of their self-image. While no accurate data are available on the exact number of men and women who regularly practise religious rites, the practising segment of the population is much smaller than the number of nominal Muslims. The most recent U.S. Department of State’s annual International Religious Freedom Report says that “Among the Muslim majority, religious observance is relatively low, and Muslim identity tends to be based more on culture and ethnicity than religion; however, there has been a gradual growth in the number of observant Muslims.”5 Accord- ing to a Gallup poll conducted in 2009, Azerbaijan is one of the least 1 Bayram Balci is Senior Research Assistant in Centre National de la Recherche Scien- tifique, Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Internationales (CERI). Since December 2011 he is Visiting Scholar in Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington DC. He was Director of the Institut Français d’Etudes sur l’Asie Centrale, (IFEAC) in Tashkent and Research Assistant in Institut Français d’Etudes Anatoliennes in Baku between 2003 and 2006. He holds degrees in Political Science and Arab-Islamic Civilisation (Sciences Po Grenoble and Aix-en-Provence) and a PhD in Political Science for a dissertation about Turkish missionaries in Central Asia. 2 Altay Goyushov is a Professor at the Department of Turkic and Caucasus People’s History of Baku State University He has a Ph.D. in History of Islam from the Baku State University, Azerbaijan. For the last decade his research interests have been focused mainly on the issues related to national independence movements, political Islam and Islamic education in the Volga basin, Crimea, Caucasus and Central Asia. 3 U.S. Department of State, BUREAU OF DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS, AND LABOR 2010 Report on International Religious Freedom, US Department of State, Azerbaijan, http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2010/148912.htm, February 2012. 4 The State Statistical Committee of the Republic of Azerbaijan http://www.azstat .org/statinfo/demoqraphic/en/AP_/AP_1.shtml, accessed February 2012. 5 U.S. Department of State BUREAU OF DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS, AND LABOR, 2010 Report on International Religious Freedom, US Department of State, Azerbaijan http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/irf/2010_5/168295.htm, accessed 16 April 2012. 42 bayram balci and altay goyushov religious countries in the world and only 21% of Azerbaijanis consider religion as an important part of daily life.6 Some sources say that less than 15% of Muslim Azerbaijanis perform prayers on a daily basis.7 Exceptions are the Ramadan and Muharram months of the Muslim calendar, when the number of active worshippers has been visibly increasing in the years since the country’s independence in 1991, particularly among younger generations. Since the mid-7th century CE the territory of modern Azerbaijan north of Araxes River has been included within the boundaries of the Caliphate. It took almost two hundred years for Islam to finally become the undis- puted dominant religion, adopted by the vast majority of the local popula- tion along with the ruling elites. In the 11th century Azerbaijan fell under the rule of Muslim Seljuk Turks. Migration from Central Asia triggered a major shift in the ethnic composition of the inhabitants populating Azer- baijan by making Turkic-Oghuz tribes its prevailing constituent, although significant populations of ethnic minorities remain. According to the last Census Azerbaijanis of Turkic origin comprise the overwhelming majority of the local population with a nearly 90.6% share. The other ethnic groups of Muslim background are Sunni Lezgins (2%), Avars (0.6%), Tsakhurs (0.2%), Kryts (Grizs) (0.04%), Xinaligs (0.02%), and Rutuls who mainly live along the Russian border in the northern Gusar-Xachmaz and Zagatala- Balaken regions of Azerbaijan. Mainly Shi’i Tats (0.13%) are another ethnic minority group who populate the northern Baku, Xizi, Devechi, Guba, and Ismayilli regions. Ethnic minorities of Muslim background also include Shi’i Talyshes (1.3%) who live along the Iranian border in the southern regions of the republic, Meskhetian turks (0.5%), Volga tatars (0.4%) and Kurds (0.2%).8 During the reign of the Safavid dynasty (1501–1732) mainstream Shi‘ism (Twelver) gradually became the leading religious branch of Islam in Azer- baijan. Since then Shi’is have been dominant in the regions of Nakh- ichevan, Qarabakh, Apsheron, Ganja, Mil, Mugan and Lenkoran, while in the regions of Sheki-Zaqatala, Quba-Qusar and Shamakhi-Qabala, Sunnis 6 GALLUP WorldView, http://www.gallup.com/poll/114211/Alabamians-Iranians-Common .aspx, accessed 18 November 2010. 7 Social Sciences in the Caucasus http://crrc-caucasus.blogspot.com/2009/02/gallup- azerbaijan-is-one-of-least.html accessed February 2012. 8 Official webpage of the President of the Azerbaijani Republic http://www.president .az/browse.php?sec_id=51&lang=en, accessed 11 February 2012 and http://modern.az/ articles/15550/1/, accessed 11 February 2012..
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