Painful Concessions Needed For Peace
RFE/RL’s Armenia Service reports that on the second day of a Parliamentary hearing on resolution of the Karabagh conflict, the Armenian Defense Minister, Serzh Sarkisyan, has said that “painful” concessions from both sides are necessary in order to secure peace. In particular, he appears to confirm rumors regarding details of a proposed settlement currently being discussed through the OSCE Minsk Group.
According to those rumors that have been circulating around Yerevan for quite some time now, a phased rather than package deal is on the table that offers some security guarantees for Armenians living in Karabagh.
The remarks appeared to be an indirect confirmation of the Armenian side’s readiness to embrace a peace formula that would contain at least some elements of a gradual resolution of the conflict. The parties allegedly discussed last year a deal calling for an Armenian troop withdrawal and a future referendum in Karabakh.
The full text of this news item can be read here.
Although Sarkisyan isn’t reported to have provided in depth details of this plan, unconfirmed rumors suggest that three regions surrounding Karabagh currently under Armenian control would be immediately returned to Azerbaijan and Karabagh would be considered an Armenian protectorate until a referendum is held 5-10 years later.
The timetable for the return of other territories, but presumably not Lachin, would be determined during this period while confidence-building measures are implemented.
It is amazing that things are actually happening…
Comment by Katy — 3/30/2005 @ 10:48 pm
It’s amazing but at the same time concerning. Even last year when we heard details of what is on the table many people involved in politics suggested that a deal would come this year. Incidentally, this is why there is no significant EU or US support for the opposition in either country because they need Kocharian and Aliyev to get closer to this potential breakthrough.
However, it’s not as simple as that is it because public opinion in both republics is an unknown quantity and it is believed that any talk of concession can be used by the opposition in both countries. Do Armenians want to concede anything? Do Azeris? Will war break out again if they don’t?
There is also other talk going around albeit sometimes contradictory. One scenerio put forward by pro-opposition forces is that a peace deal would be signed and then Kocharian would resign, handing over power to Serzh Sarkisyan. Other talk puts forward that the idea that internal domestic trouble would be used to avoid signing a deal (and this goes for both Armenia and Azerbaijan) and that Kocharian might even resign if necessary thus putting the talks back to square one.
Of course, what makes this problematic is that even though nothing would change territorially, Azerbaijan is talking of war if the peace negotiations collapse and is also taking a particularly tough line on the status of Karabagh because while most people know Karabagh will never be part of Azerbaijan, Aliyev is unsure as to whether he can survive such a concession. This is why a referendum in the future has been suggested — to delay such potential problems.
However, the imminent Parliamentary Elections make this a little more problematic given that the opposition in Azerbaijan could capitalize on talks of concession hence the talk of war now. Unfortunately, this talk is also accompanied by changes in the frontline which indicates that this might be more than just a bluff. Of course, talk of war is also a way to test public opinion in Armenia and this is why unlike Key West, there has been quite a lot of coverage of these hearings.
I’ll have a clearer idea of how serious the Armenian side takes talk of war in 2 months when my wife’s brother is due to complete his military service and return from the front line. Of course, if the threat of war is serious, I daresay he won’t be coming back home so soon.
My gut reaction is that after falsified elections in Armenia and Azerbaijan, both Presidents are in weaker positions than they’ve ever been and that is precisely why the Council of Europe in particular was restrained in its condemnation. For the the West, resolution of the Karabagh conflict is considered the most important issue over anything else. It might even be for Russia as some suggest that they are trying to move closer to Azerbaijan. To make things even more confusing, others suggest that Russia would like to use Karabagh to destablize the situation in the region to prevent further American penetration.
Interestingly, many Ambassadors were present at the hearings and I believe that they think that resolution of the Karabagh conflict is close. In fact, this has been said to me by one foreign representative close to the US Embassy. Even the Russian former co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group took a less than pro-Armenian stance which surprised many people including the authorities here. Basically, momentum is building up and I don’t suppose it’s any coincidence that the BTC pipeline is scheduled to be completed in November this year.
Ironically, in the same month, Parliamentary Elections will be held in Azerbaijan so a) there is only a small window of opportunity this year before significant domestic political tension emerges in Azerbaijan and b) I’m sure that Aliyev realises that talk of a peace settlement is both a blessing and a curse.
FIrstly, if it is seen that Armenia is holding up any resolution, Azerbaijan is in a stronger position to restart hostilities although its military is weaker than the Armenian side. On the other hand, talk of concession puts Aliyev in a weaker position domestically but at the same time gives him the opportunity to try to prevent what would undoubtedly be significant public outrage against any attempt to falsify those elections.
To be honest, I don’t know what will happen. There is now talk of both peace and war and I think that both are genuine. This uncertainty is the problem. Are the Presidents of both Armenia and Azerbaijan in better positions than they were in Key West (albeit with Aliyev snr in the seat instead of Ilham)? I think not.
The determining factor is public opinion and this is still unknown — hence why I think the National Assembly openly spoke about resolution now. It was for both domestic and foreign consumption.
Comment by Onnik — 3/30/2005 @ 11:32 pm
Incidentally, I found it interesting to see the reaction of my wife to all this talk. In 2001, during Key West and up until the end of last year, any mention of concessions would be met with hostility from her. Nothing should be returned, Nakhichevan should be demanded from the Azeris, if they want anything let them fight for it and lose etc.
This time, after she saw Serzh Sarkisyan speak of the need for concessions on TV, she hasn’t said a thing. This is different from 2001. Then when I said, Oskanian, Sarkisyan and Babayan are talking of the possibility of war breaking out again she said she hoped that her brother would be back before then.
My response was that if they take the threat of war seriously, I doubt he’d be back when he’s due. She walked away without saying a thing. Personally, I have never seen her so quiet on this topic before and I think seeing Serzh Sarkisyan on TV today made it obvious to her at least that talk of this new peace drive is very serious.
I certainly don’t remember such open discussion during Key West. This alone makes me think that something is close.
What still remains uncertain is how Azerbaijani society will respond and my gut reaction is that talk of peace can be be used by both the government and opposition there to either repress dissent in the run-up to the elections or to mobilize anti-government sentiment.
Comment by Onnik — 3/31/2005 @ 12:18 am
So it took 8 years for Serzh Sargsian and company to come to the same conclusion as Levon Ter-Petrosian. At least they are being realistic this time.
Comment by H Nazarian — 3/31/2005 @ 12:32 am
With the exception of the fact that we think Karabagh’s status is defined ie. it is for Karabagh Armenians to decide.
Comment by Onnik — 3/31/2005 @ 12:48 am
Neither the Azeri or Armenian Presidents are interested in peace right now because peace would mean the weakening of their power base; therefore, spell the end of both of them. They both use this conflict as a means to freighten people and stay in power. With that said, even if the above mentioned wasn’t so, the current militaristic statements coming out of Baku and the continued and deliberate violation of the ceasefire by Azerbaijan confirms the fact that the Azeris are not at all willing to make concessions on any of the issues in this conflict, therefore, the negotiations at this point are completely meaningless. Armenia must be ready for war at any point, hold free, transparent, and completely fair elections, and continue to economically and politically integrate into Europe. Also Armenia must win the propaganda war, the issue of the second Armenian Genocide from 1988 to 1991 must be brought up over and over again in international organizations, 300,000 thousand of our kin left everything behind in Baku, Sumgait, and Kirovabad and left, including money, homes, businesses etc… their status must be discussed in the international community. As well as the brutal murder of Gurgen Markaryan by a racist Azeri thug named Ramil Safarov who has been named a “hero” in his country worthy of medals. May God Bless Armenia and lead Armenians all throughtout the world in the right path.
Comment by Roders Shagvaladyan — 3/31/2005 @ 6:50 am
Not going to happen now or in the foreseen future. People who think turks will agree to concessions are
day dreaming, they don’t understand their mentality.
Remember the turkish proverb: trust a snake before you
trust a greek, trust a greek before you trust a jew,
never trust an armenian.
Anyways, sorry to rain on peoples hopes, just very
sceptical about these talks that seem to break anytime
there is a political change on a horizon.
Comment by Tim — 3/31/2005 @ 7:16 am
Tim,
Definately I agree with you. And I am sure that Armenian citizens of the Republic of Armenia well know who turks are.
Tim, if you know Armenian then read this:
Թանը փչիր, հետո խմիր։ (Armenian Unicode script)
Comment by Հակոբ Գեւորգյան — 3/31/2005 @ 10:25 am
Well, they backed down from the agreements at Key West and as I said, I am not sure that there is the mood for concessions in Azerbaijan, specially when it can be exploited by the opposition there. In the meantime, the Armenian position is being forumlated through these hearings and for once, the government and opposition spoke with the same voice. The only uncertainty surrounds this warning of war from Oskanian, Serzh Sarkisyan and various senior war veterans. It’s probably brinkmanship on the part of Azerbaijan but a very dangerous game to play.
Comment by Onnik — 3/31/2005 @ 1:38 pm
If this is the final deal, then they are really jumping through hoops to make things look other than what they are. If Karabakh gets to vote on it’s fate in 5 or 10 years, we already know the outcome, so if returning three regions in return for Karabakh’s independence is being called a package approach, let it be. These details have been printed before, I wonder what the other specifics are. The final status of Lachin, the actual borders of the corridor.
At this point, hostilities hurt Azerbaijan a great deal more. To put it callously, if Armenians get pushed back some, they lose some land and have a few more refugees, while if Azerbaijan get pushed back some, they have the same issues, plus the safety of the pipeline to think about. Any hostility at all will cause oil companies to become wary of further investments, or even cause some to pull out… I don’t think it’s going to happen - but never say never, right?
Comment by Raffi Kojian — 3/31/2005 @ 7:59 pm
That’s the point of the referendum, basically. We know what the outcome is and so can assume that as long as the necessary security guarantees are there, Karabagh will become internationally recognized as an indepdendent state. We know that this was already agreed upon at Key West but Aliyev snr backed down when he got home. The idea of the referendum effectively (or at least, theoretically) postpones any potential problems in Azerbaijan and allows Aliyev jnr to say that he hasn’t lost Karabagh (yet). I would also imagine that the other requirement of the Armenian side is included — a land link between Armenia and Karabagh i.e. Lachin.
In fact, this seems to be the general consensus among all political forces in Armenia — Karabagh must not be part of Azerbaijan, the security of Armenians in Karabagh must be internationally recognized and protected and there should be a landlink between what would be two Armenian Republics.
Probably, you could argue that after independence Karabagh would actually be free to later decide to become part of Armenia.
As for war, most analysts consider that if the war were to start up again, there would be no changes in the front line i.e. no territory would be lost or gained. Basically, conflict would last a few weeks before another ceasefire was agreed upon and a couple of thousand would die.
It doesn’t make sense for Azerbaijan to do anything like this and it would destabilize the whole region. However, I could imagine that Aliyev could use a small-scale conflict to either postpone parliamentary elections in the aftermath of Georgia, Ukraine and Krgyzstan or persecute the opposition under the pretext of national security.
Personally, I think its brinkmanship and part of a game designed to get the maximum amount of concessions from Armenia. However, it is a dangerous game because once you go so far, anything can happen. Interestingly, Serzh Sarkisyan has reportedly requested that the former Russian co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group to take up the issue of a change in the position of the Azeri forces up with the Russian Foreign Minister.
Never occured to me until reading this report that the 1994 ceasefire fixed the positions of Armenian and Azeri forces so any change is actually a violation of the agreement.
Comment by Onnik — 3/31/2005 @ 8:30 pm
It’s clear any new war will result in the deafeat of the Azeri side. Azerbaijan’s military is in no position to go face to face with Armenia’s combat ready, morale high armed forces. Hostilities would result in complete embarrassment for Azerbaijan and the thought that Karabakh would ever return under their control would completely disappear from their heads. Therefore, the Azeris are not at all interested in war, they are only interested in talking tough and deliberatly breaking the ceasefire from time to time to thwart the negotiations because they believe the longer the status quo prevails, the longer the Armenian-Azeri and Armenian-Turkish borders will remian closed and Armenia will be economically isolated and Armenians will leave the country. This is Azerbaijan’s only hope of ever regaining Karabakh, that is why fighting corruption and having a legitimate government to trully work on Armenia’s economic hardships is so crucial. There are some nations who can afford corruption and dictators etc… Armenia cannot, therefore, Armenians need to put the interests of certain political parties aside and fight to make Armenia a stronger nation more realistically, not by being blind.
Comment by Roders Shagvaladyan — 4/1/2005 @ 10:43 am
The fighting corruption and democracy points are right on the mark, for sure.
Comment by Onnik — 4/1/2005 @ 11:12 am
For the record, armenian forces are not battle ready
and the morale is extremely low. I personally know
people who are either serving or did serve in
so-called armenian army, and experience is pretty
horrible.
To this day I don’t understand how the heck we won
this war. Also, the atittude “we gonna win this time also” is pretty appalling. Who’s gonna fight ? Are you going to volunteer ? Donate money and think you’ve done your part ? Unfortunately, if god forbid another war breaks out, it is going to be fought by your regular Hovik and Armen from Bangladesh and Martuni, not by Dikran and Raffi from Glendale and Watertown.
Anytime I hear this talk that the next time we are going to march to Baku, I want to tell the stories of people who I knew who got killed in this war for being too idealistic, and I want to tell the stories of their families who are reduced to poverty now.
Anyways, as I said in the previous post, I don’t think
there will be any changes or settlement for a foreseable future, the situation will develop into a Cyprus like scenario; too much is at stake and no one wants another uncertainty in a south caucasus.
Comment by Tim — 4/1/2005 @ 6:13 pm
I definetely do not wish for another war and hope there isn’t one. However, if war is brought upon Armenia, she will have no choice but to defend herself. We do not need to march to Baku or control more territories than we already have. As for suggestions that Armenia’s armed forces are not battle ready, they are completely baseless. The Army is the sole institution in the country that fuctions properly. Armenia in fact maintains the most combat ready army in the CIS besides Russia. If Azerbaijan had any doubts about this, they would waste no time in making the first advancements.
Comment by Roders Shagvaladyan — 4/2/2005 @ 8:39 am
I don’t think anyone has suggested that Armenian army is not battle-ready. Even the Azeris know this. General consensus is that the Azeri army couldn’t take back any territory and any war would be short-lived and would just lead to new ceasefire agreement. It’s brinkmanship as I said and a very dangerous game for Aliyev to play.
Comment by Onnik — 4/2/2005 @ 1:46 pm
Oh, I see now. Tim raised this issue. Well, he makes some valid points about who would actually fight (and die) but while I’d say that the Armenian military isn’t exactly a bundle of laughs (so much so that the sons of officials and the elite here bribe their way out of service), it is in a significantly better shape than the Azeri army but that’s probably not saying much.
Comment by Onnik — 4/2/2005 @ 1:48 pm
I am ready to participate if war starts against Armenia.
Comment by Հակոբ Գեւորգյան — 4/3/2005 @ 4:57 am
Whatever position the armed forces are in, and I can guarantee anyone that they’re fully combat ready, in the first war for Artsagh, Armenians had much less than what they have today in terms of organization, weaponry, professionalism etc… and they won decisively. Imagine what can happen now. As for whose going to fight, whoever is in the army and the reserves are goint to fight. This is their job and duty, and for those of us Armenian men who aren’t members of Armenia’s army and do not live in Armenia, there are others ways to help. However, of course, no one wishes for war, and one would hope there is not a second war.
Comment by Roders Shagvaladyan — 4/3/2005 @ 11:02 am