Armenian paper warns Karabakh leader against yielding to Moscow’s pressure

Haykakan Zhamanak, Yerevan
17 Mar 05

Text of Arman Karapetyan’s report by Armenian newspaper Haykakan
Zhamanak on 17 March headlined “Stepanakert under Russian pressure”

The recent statement made in Moscow by Abkhaz President Sergey Bagapsh
that it will become known in the next few days where and when the
presidents of the self-proclaimed republics of Abkhazia, South
Ossetia, Transdniestria and Nagornyy Karabakh will meet has caused
anxiety among some circles in Armenia and the Nagornyy Karabakh
Republic [NKR].

The point is that NKR President Arkadiy Gukasyan is in Moscow at the
moment in order to discuss the aforesaid issue. The presidents of
South Ossetia and Transdniestria may also be there, which means that
the presidents may have already met. However, for fear of being
labelled as a force fanning the flames of the conflict, Moscow does
not want to make it officially known that it has arranged such a
meeting. And so Armenia and the NKR are afraid that Gukasyan may yield
to Russian pressure and agree to take part in such a meeting and what
is even worse, may agree to host it in Stepanakert. The point is that
for many years already, Moscow has been trying to organize such a
meeting not somewhere else, but in Stepanakert.

The first reason is that as a state, the NKR is the most successful
among the four regions. Second, the NKR army has managed to take
control of several Azerbaijani districts, which has created some sort
of aura around it. On the other hand, unlike the other three, the NKR
has avoided having the image of Russia’s puppet, which does not please
Moscow, of course. So by assembling its puppets in Stepanakert, Russia
will get the legitimate role of a post-Soviet conflict manager and
will create a format allowing it to have a single tool to control the
conflicts.

However, what is good for Moscow is not acceptable for the Armenian
side. First of all, the Armenian side has always stated that it is
against drawing parallels between the four conflicts saying that each
conflict has its own peculiarities and history and should be given a
special solution. If the NKR joins the above format, it will therefore
admit that the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict is similar to the conflicts
in Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Transdniestria, which will make our
difficult state even more difficult. Besides that, the Nagornyy
Karabakh conflict is given probably the most serious international
negotiating format by the USA, Russia and France, which are directly
involved in this process.

So if the NKR joins Moscow’s “self-proclaimed” format, it will be a
slap in the face of the other two OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs and the
[OSCE Minsk Group] format in general. This would play into the hands
of Azerbaijan which never misses a chance to accuse the OSCE Minsk
Group of inefficiency. Inefficiency is not, however, the real
point. The real point is that the other post-Soviet conflicts whose
formats, as we have already said, are inferior to the format of the
OSCE Minsk Group, are regarded by the international community as an
internal affair of a state: the conflicts in Abkhazia and South
Ossetia are internal problems of Georgia and Transdniestria of
Moldova. This is not the case with the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict,
which is still regarded as an international problem. But there is a
big danger that it will stop being an international problem.

Hence, the aggravation of the NKR’s relations with the especially
attentive international community would help Azerbaijan put the
Nagornyy Karabakh conflict on the same level as the other three
conflicts, which is unacceptable and would mean a setback for the
1988-1989 situation. This is the problem Arkadiy Gukasyan is now
facing in Moscow. Of course, logic says that he should not accede to
Moscow’s proposal, but as far as we know, the Russian Foreign Ministry
is exerting huge pressure both on Armenia and the NKR.

Some even say that this will be a precondition for Vladimir Putin’s
visit to Armenia. In this light, it seems that Armenia might have been
used by Gukasyan as the first target for pressure. This may keep
Armenia away from the puppet format. One cannot say for sure yet if
Armenia is succeeding in doing so. This does not, however, make
Gukasyan’s role less important – for at least formally he has the
right to have a final say on the matter.