Colonel General Safar Akhundbala oghlu Abiyev (Azerbaijani: Səfər Axundbala oğlu Əbiyev; born January 27, 1950) was the Minister of Defense of Azerbaijan from 1995 to 2013.

[9] In November 2011, the United States Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus met with Abiyev and President Aliyev, afterwards he announced that the military ties between their countries would expand.

[12] In early 2013, he came under criticism from demonstrators during the Baku protests, after Azerbaijani Army soldier Ceyhun Qubadov was found dead on 7 January.

It was first reported that the cause of death was heart attack, however Qubadov's family asked for an investigation as they believed it was a murder.

Hundreds of protesters gathered at the Fountains Square with slogans such as "Stop killing our soldiers" and "You must answer to us.

[16] Abiyev penned an article after the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war, where he praised the role of Presidents Aliyev and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, declared that tensions in relations between Azerbaijan and Russia were not beneficial and that "Armenians are one of the few nations in the world that had neither a real national history, nor a homeland, nor a land.