Taleh Ziyadov: Nagorno-Karabakh peace process: Will it succeed?
TDN
Saturday, May 21, 2005
OPINIONS
Taleh ZIYADOV*
The expectations are high since the presidents of Armenia and
Azerbaijan, Robert Kocharian and Ilham Aliyev, respectively, met on
the sidelines of the Council of Europe summit in Warsaw on May 16.
Shortly after the meeting of the presidents, the foreign minister
of Azerbaijan, Elmar Mammadyarov, announced that Armenia is ready to
return seven occupied areas surrounding the former Nagorno-Karabakh
(NK) autonomous region. Armenian troops currently occupy NK.
For almost a year, the foreign ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan
have been engaged in a series of major talks in Strasburg and Prague,
trying to find a common solution to one of the longest-standing
conflicts in the former Soviet Union.
The talks between the foreign ministers were held in strict secrecy,
but the parties appeared to have come to some sort of initial
agreement, which led Organization for Security and Cooperation in
Europe’s (OSCE) Minsk Group co-chairs from France, Russia and the
United States to introduce their “new” peace proposal in London on
April 15.
Yuri Merzlyakov, Russian co-chair of the Minsk Group, announced that
“the parties seem to have reached a point where a meeting of the
presidents should give a new impetus to negotiations.”
Despite numerous attempts in the past by the Minsk Group and direct
talks between the governments of Armenia and Azerbaijan, the parties
have not been able to soothe their differences. This time, however,
the Minsk Group co-chairs were convinced that the parties were at a
“sensitive juncture” and that is why the meeting between Aliyev and
Kocharian was so important.
Since the signing of a ceasefire agreement in 1994, Armenia and
Azerbaijan have crossed many “sensitive junctures” they thought would
lead them to a final agreement. And yet, they are still negotiating. Is
it because the proposals by the Minsk Group did not fully satisfy
one or the other party, or is it because they all are driving in the
wrong direction?
While analysts and diplomats have claimed the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict
is complex and difficult to resolve, the Minsk Group co-chairs have
consistently called on both parties to make “painful compromises,”
confusing the already puzzled populations of Armenia and Azerbaijan.
The phrase “painful compromise” has a different resonance in the ears
of Armenians and Azerbaijanis. For Armenians it may imply going back
to the situation in the 1990s when the region had loose autonomy. For
Azerbaijanis it may entail ceding a part of their territory. For both,
the aforementioned compromises are nightmares.
The nightmare for the international community, however, stems from the
conceptual debate of the issue. It is a clash between the concepts of
self-determination and territorial integrity that makes international
organizations such as the United Nations, Council of Europe and OSCE
reluctant to act more effectively on adopted resolutions.
When the two concepts clash, international law gives preference to
territorial integrity. But lack of enforcement mechanisms on the
part of the international community and the vaguely defined and
controversial term of self-determination make a solution for the
conflict almost impossible.
For more than a decade, Armenia and Azerbaijan have viewed the NK
conflict from a perspective of where self-determination meant secession
— thus a breakup of the existing state. Indeed, secessionism has
been one of the major obstacles to peace in the region.
Professor of International Relations at Michigan State University
Mohammed Ayoob argues that the term “self-determination” should be
“de-linked from secession and should be defined in terms of empowering
those segments of the population that have been denied access to
political and economic power. In other words, self-determination
should be perceived as synonymous with democratization (and its
attendant power-sharing arrangements) rather than with the breakup
of existing states.”
Dr. Ayoob’s definition is even more relevant to the Caucasus region,
which is a melting pot of hundreds of multi-ethnic and multi-religious
societies. It is also true for Armenians and Azerbaijanis whose
integration into larger European and international organizations
is inevitable.
If only the international community would have stood firmly behind its
principles and the conflicting parties could have looked at the issues
from a problem-solving perspective rather than a maximalist bargaining
approach, the nightmares could have been avoided a long time ago.
Today, the two states realize that the longer the conflict continues to
sit unresolved, the more dangerous and problematic it may become. In
particular, it threatens regional and global security by sustaining
uncontrolled “grey zones.” It hinders both states’ regional integration
and keeps Armenia out of regional energy projects. More importantly,
the status quo does not preclude Azerbaijan from using force to
restore its territorial integrity.
Therefore, reaching an agreement to bring along the withdrawal
of Armenian troops from occupied Azerbaijani lands and opening
communication between the two states is vital to the entire NK
peace process. It will allow for the beginning of dialogue between
official Baku and the Armenian community of NK and the start of the
reintegration process of the exiled Azerbaijani community.
Furthermore, it will settle the issue of Internally Displaced Persons
(IDP) for Azerbaijan, while Armenians can receive guarantees of a
non-resumption of war.
Indeed, the resolution of the NK conflict is complicated as is the
resolution of all other ethnic and territorial conflicts around the
world, but it is not impossible. With a little more attention from
the international community and interested parties, the NK conflict
is solvable.
For Armenians and Azerbaijanis, the 21st century should not be a
century of occupation, ethnic hatred and isolation, but a century of
peace, reconciliation and integration.
* Taleh Ziyadov is a graduate fellow at the Center for Eurasian,
Russian and East European Studies at Georgetown University’s Edmund
A. Walsh School of Foreign Service.