Viktor Andriyanov, Guseinbala Miralamov . Geidar Aliev. Moscow, Nurlar, 2005.

Chance is often described as blind. There is even a set phrase in Russian–a blind chance. However, it is not blind at all. Blind are those people who don’t notice signs of fate. On November 27, 1944, General De Gaulle, leader of “Fighting France” movement, head of the Provisional Government of the French Republic and future President of the country, stopped in Baku on his way to Moscow where he was going to have negotiations with Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin, Chairman of the Soviet of People’s Commissars. This eminent–in direct and figurative meanings–guest was welcomed as the leader of the allied state. In his two-week journey throughout the Soviet Union Alexei Nikolayevich Kosygin, Deputy Chairman of the Sovnarkom accompanied him, on Stalin’s personal instructions. Many years later Alexei Kosygin, Chairman of the USSR Council of Ministers, came to Paris on an official visit. Contrary to all rules of the diplomatic protocol President De Gaulle personally arrived at the airport to meet the Soviet Premier. But it is another case and another story...