In connection with the early elections on February 7 in Azerbaijan, the Institute of Geography named after Academician Hasan Aliyev held a scientific workshop on the topic “Political and electoral geography: geography of elections”, with the participation of employees of the Center for Spatial Analysis of International Relations of the Institute of International Studies of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

The event was attended by guests from Moscow, as well as professors of Baku State University Chingiz Ismayilov and Aydin Ibrahimov, lecturer at BSU, PhD on Philology Emin Alekperly and IG dissertation candidate Aslan Babakhanov.

IG Director General, Professor Zakir Eminov, welcomed the guests and made an opening speech. Speaking about the need to hold early elections in Azerbaijan, the director of the institute noted that the event was held on the basis of a memorandum of cooperation dated February 23, 2023, concluded between the Institute of Geography and the Center for Spatial Analysis of International Relations, Institute of International Studies of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The head of the Center Igor Sergeyevich Okunev  made a report “Political and electoral geography: the potential of using geoinformation modeling and spatial statistical analysis” and donated original books to the Institute of Geography.

Then, according to the seminar program, reports were heard on the following topics:

Restoration of the territorial integrity of the republic and its impact on the election results (Head of the Department of Economic and Social Geography of BSU, PhD on Economics, Prof. Ismayilov Chingiz).

MGIMO Scientific and Methodological School on Political and Electoral Geography (Senior Lecturer, Department of Comparative Political Science, PhD Marianna Nikolaevna Shestakova).

On the issue of the electoral geography of Turkey (Head of the Department of Economic and Political Geography of Foreign Countries and Tourism, BSU, Doctor of Economics, Prof. Ibragimov Aydin).

International political influence of states: spatial modeling of the system of international relations, multidimensional scaling and spatial cluster analysis (Director of the Center for Analysis and Promotion of the Results of Scientific Activities, senior researcher at MGIMO, MFA of Russia, PhD Evgenia Aleksandrovna Zakharova).

Transformations of electoral behavior in the Russian border region: comparative spatial analysis (Research fellow in the Center for Spatial Analysis of International Relations, Institute of International Studies of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Lidiya Sergeevna Zhirnova).

Spatial databases of TsPAMO IMI on political and electoral geography in the repositories of MGIMO and Harvard University: experience of creation and patenting (Researcher in the Center for Spatial Analysis of International Relations, Institute of International Studies of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ostapenko German Igorevich).

Autonomous GIS and language models in electoral analysis: innovative methodologies and prospects (Dissertation candidate at the Institute of Geography named after academician H.A. Aliyev Babakhanov Aslan).

The long and interesting workshop ended with an exchange of ideas on reports. The workshop also adopted a proposal to hold a scientific workshop in a remote format with the joint participation of Turkish-Azerbaijani-Russian geographers.

A collective commemorative photo was taken at the end of the meeting.