Opposition groups in Azerbaijan are calling for the release of a 20-year-old political activist who was arrested last week after posting a message on his Facebook page calling for Egypt-style protests in Baku's central square.

Although Azerbaijani officials denied the arrest was politically motivated, the situation highlights growing tensions between opposition groups and the government following the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt.

Two days after the Egyptian protests began on Jan. 25, the government appeared to launch a preemptive strike against an similar uprising in Azerbaijan.

The government's anti-corruption commission, which is overseen by presidential Chief of Staff Ramiz Mehiyev, convened Jan. 27 for the first time since 2009. In the following weeks, several government officials have made announcements promising far-reaching anti-corruption measures within government ministries. According to the newspaper Yeni Musavat. 18-year president Ilham Aliyev is also considering reshuffling his Cabinet and calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Artur Rasizade.

At the end of January, government employees received orders to "avoid irritating the population and to work effectively and build public trust,” according to the news website EurasiaNet. 

Armenia finds itself in an unfriendly neighborhood and engaged in a highly militarized 20-year territorial dispute with Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave. It has long pulled off a diplomatic coup, maintaining simultaneous close relations with Iran, Russia and the United States, all three of which it relies on for protection, investment and trade.

But the chickens came home to roost two years ago when it drew the ire of the U.S. government upon the discovery by U.S. intelligence that Armenia had transferred Bulgarian missiles and rockets to Iran, according to a December 2008 cable from the secretary of State, posted on WikiLeaks.

Those weapons were later "recovered from two Shia militant attacks in which a U.S. soldier was killed and six others were injured in Iraq," according to a January 2009 cable from the U.S. Embassy in Yerevan. 

Washington was demanding answers, and Armenia was feeling the heat. 

Azerbaijani President Iham Aliyev awoke Friday to the diplomatic equivalent of a severed horse head in his bed.

According to a leaked U.S. diplomatic cable, the staff of the U.S. Embassy in Baku has been comparing the president, rather unflatteringly, to Sonny Corleone, the most impulsive and thin-skinned of Don Vito Corleone’s sons in the hit novel and film trilogy, "The Godfather."

In a secret cable entitled “President Ilham Aliyev – Michael (Corleone) on the outside, Sonny on the inside,” sent in September 2009, U.S. diplomats describe the Azerbaijan president as similar to Michael Corleone -– which is to say, “cool-headed” and “realistic” –- when dealing with foreign partners, but similar to Sonny Corleone –- which translates to “harsh,” over-reactive, and “increasingly authoritarian” -– when dealing with domestic issues.

In a turn of events that has both Georgian and American diplomats walking on eggshells, Georgia and Iran agreed this week to eliminate visa restrictions and resume direct flights between Tbilisi and Tehran.

This new open-border policy comes at a time when Iran -- facing a fresh round of European, U.S., and Russian-backed sanctions, internal unrest and an array of external military threats -- is desperate for a few friendly faces in its own backyard.

But Iran’s new-found friendship has Georgia -- the United States' closest ally in the Caucasus, and the recipient of roughly $4.5 billion in Western aid in the past two years -- dancing the diplomatic two-step.