[Comment] A chance to resolve Karabakh
ALEXANDROS PETERSEN
01.04.2008 @ 07:15 CET
EUOBSERVER / COMMENT - In the 'Writers' Guidelines' section of Foreign Policy magazine's website, the editors offer a bit of advice to the would be wonk writing for the journal: 'Unless your piece on Nagorno-Karabakh is going to be relevant or worth reading by someone in, say, Antananarivo, don't bother sending it'.
A graveyard in Nagorno-Karabakh - the situation is often perceived as a 'confusing ethnic conflict' (Photo: www.nkr.am)
Such a view of the now 20-year-old conflict in the Caucasus is not uncommon outside of the region. Karabakh has become synonymous with 'confusing ethnic conflict in an unfamiliar part of the world in which the EU probably shouldn't get involved'. Yet despite media focus on Russia's elections and China's crackdown in Tibet, Karabakh received a mention in European media recently due to one of the largest clashes across the ceasefire line since the end of large-scale fighting in 1994.
The incident's significance is heightened by the violent aftermath of Armenia's 19 February presidential elections, in which the incumbent prime minister, Serzh Sarkisian, claimed 52% of the vote, in polls considered questionable by international observers and fraudulent by the opposition.
In scenes reminiscent of the colour revolutions in Georgia and Ukraine, tens of thousands of protestors backing former president, Levon Ter-Petrosian, the main opposition challenger, as well as other contenders, gathered in Yerevan's Liberty square to demand a re-examination of poll results. On March 1, government security forces swept in and forcibly dispersed the crowd with truncheons, cattle-prods and tear gas. Several opposition leaders were detained and Ter-Petrosian escorted home by a security detail.
Despite several wounded, protesters regrouped in front of Yerevan's municipal authority with renewed and openly exhibited defiance. As the growing crowd made barricades out of buses, and swelled to about 15,000, beefed-up security forces surrounded the group, and clashes ensued. Security personnel fired tracer bullets above the heads of the crowd, and tear gas canisters into it, as protesters responded with molotov cocktails and any projectiles they could find. The end result was eight deaths and a 20-day state of emergency imposed on the country by outgoing president, Robert Kocharian.
Three days later, as tanks and armoured vehicles enforced calm in central Yerevan, uncommonly intense violence erupted in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone, with reports of larger-calibre gunfire than that normally crossing the frozen lines of battle. Azerbaijan's defence ministry said that three of its soldiers were killed as they were attacked, but that 12 Armenian soldiers perished in response. The ethnic-Armenian self-declared Nagorno-Karabakh forces claimed only two of their comrades, but eight Azerbaijanis had died during an attack and counterattack initiated by Azerbaijan.
We may never know whether the new Armenian leadership launched a strike in Karabakh to divert attention from events in Yerevan, or whether Azerbaijan's military took the opportunity of political instability to test the Armenians. But violence in the conflict zone and on the streets of Yerevan signals that it is time for both sides, as well as international mediators, to get serious about resolution of Nagorno-Karabakh.
Azerbaijan's president, Ilham Aliyev, has made it clear that Karabakh must be back in Azerbaijani hands by 2013, and only a day before the clashes, underscored his determination to consider armed force as an option in doing so. His statements are backed by $1 billion in defence spending, fuelled by his country's Caspian oil boom, and an Azerbaijani-backed UN General Assembly decision hurriedly approved on 14 March. The urgency with which Azerbaijani officials speak of resolution, in one way or another, was lately increased by Kosovo's declaration of independence, and the view that it might set a precedent for the self-styled Nagorno-Karabakh Republic.
But, the onus is on Yerevan to change the current situation. The international community has made it clear that Karabakh and the seven territories under occupation surrounding it are only be recognised as part of Azerbaijan. So far, Baku has stressed territorial integrity – with 20 percent of its territory under Armenian control – while Yerevan has highlighted concerns for the rights of the ethnic-Armenian minority within Azerbaijan.
Within the Minsk Group, the OSCE-sponsored mediation mechanism co-chaired by Russia, France and the U.S., Baku has pledged autonomy for Karabakh, but Armenia insists on a referendum being held in the territory – bereft of hundreds of thousands of ethnic Azeri natives that fled the war.
As a native of the region, and in response to Ter-Petrosian's unpopular attempts at reconciliation, Sarkisian dragged his feet on Karabakh while prime minister. But violent protests in support of Ter-Petrosian and clashes in the conflict zone mean he now has the impetus to move toward peace. His decision to bring the third-party self-styled pro-Western reformer, Artur Bagdasarian, into his coalition government may signal a step in that direction. This opportunity, however, raises the responsibility of Brussels and European governments, regional powers, as well influential members of the Armenian diaspora, to push for a resolution as soon as possible.
The dividends of peace would be substantial. After close to two decades of independence, Armenia could finally have its borders to Azerbaijan and Turkey open to trade. The potential would emerge for Armenia to diversify its economy away from foreign remittances, as it would suddenly find itself part of the burgeoning East-West energy and transport corridor linking Asia with Europe. Resolution of the conflict would also mean less reliance on Russia for military aid, and Iran for natural resources.
However, the region's powers would also benefit from decreased potential for full-scale conflict and the disappearance of frozen instability close to Russia's restive North Caucasus, Turkey's neighbouring Nakhchivan, and Iran's majority ethnic-Azeri north. Europe and the U.S. would benefit from a new partner in the region, new options for the transit of Caspian energy, and the neutralisation of a potential hot-spot within increasingly tense relations with Russia - a prospect which even the denizens of Antananarivo might find significant.
The author is Programme Director of the Caspian Europe Center, Brussels.'