EurasiaNet, NY
May 9 2006

NAGORNO-KARABAKH: ANOTHER SUMMIT MEETING IS PLANNED
Haroutiun Khachatrian 5/09/06

Armenia and Azerbaijan seem prepared to make yet another attempt at
settling the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The presidents of the two
states are now tentatively scheduled to hold their second summit
meeting of the year.

Armenian officials revealed May 5 that President Robert Kocharian
hopes to meet his Azerbaijani counterpart, Ilham Aliyev, in June. The
precise time and venue for the summit will be determined at a meeting
between the Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers later in May.
The announcement followed an early May meeting of the OSCE’s Minsk
Group – comprising representatives of the United States, Russia and
France. Following that Minsk Group meeting in Moscow, French Minsk
Group Co-Chair Bernard Fassier traveled to Yerevan and Baku to secure
both parties’ agreement to another summit.

There were high hopes for a breakthrough heading into the first
summit meeting of the year between Kocharian and Aliyev, held in
February in France. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].
However, that meeting ended without any tangible progress toward a
lasting peace settlement. Both sides have remained tight-lipped about
the discussions in France, as well as about any new proposals
currently under consideration.

Armenian Foreign Minister Vardan Oskanian indicated that Karabakh
discussions remained in an acutely sensitive phase, in which the
slightest misstep by either side could derail the renewed efforts to
foster a peace deal. “The problem now is to avoid a setback, and we
expect appropriate moves from Azerbaijan,” the Armenpress news agency
quoted Oskanian as saying on May 7.

Since the summit meeting in France, Azerbaijan has appeared to be the
party most dissatisfied with the proposed peace framework. The first
Kocharian-Aliyev summit talks appeared to stumble over differences on
a proposed referendum that would determine Karabakh’s political
status. Aliyev and other Azerbaijani officials have since repeatedly
stated that they will never to agree to Karabakh’s secession from
Azerbaijan.

Prior to first summit of 2006, Armenia made what officials in Yerevan
considered to be a major concession, abandoning their insistence on a
so-called “package” settlement, in which Karabakh’s status would have
been determined in tandem with a decision to return to Azerbaijan
territory occupied by Armenian forces. Armenian leaders are now
willing to go along with a “step-by-step” settlement, in which the
return of occupied lands, along with the return of Azerbaijani
internally displaced persons, is followed by settlement of Karabakh’s
status.

The United States has been the most active Minsk Group member in
promoting a Karabakh settlement. Assistant Secretary of State Daniel
Fried visited the region in March, and US Minsk Group Co-Chair Steven
Mann engaged in a round of shuttle diplomacy in late April, just days
prior to Aliyev three-day visit to Washington.

Nagorno-Karabakh figured prominently in Aliyev’s discussions with US
officials, including President George W. Bush. [For background see
the Eurasia Insight archive]. Armenian officials and policy analysts
had feared that Aliyev would strike a geopolitical deal with the Bush
administration, in which Washington would provide unqualified support
for Azerbaijan on the Karabakh issue in return for Baku’s backing on
the tough US stance toward Iran.

Following Aliyev’s trip, Azerbaijani officials voiced satisfaction
with the US position on Karabakh. Nevertheless, Armenian officials
were relieved that no Azerbaijani-American geopolitical deal was
struck. “We know that Aliyev was made to understand in Washington . .
. that seeking a military solution to the Karabakh conflict is not an
option. We appreciate it,” Oskanian said, according to Armenpress.

Even if the second summit meeting is held in June as currently
planned, and the two presidents somehow manage to agree on a peace
framework, there are concerns that they will have trouble selling a
settlement to the Armenian and Azerbaijani public. In Armenia, for
example, there appears to be substantial opposition to the withdrawal
of Armenian forces from the occupied territories around Karabakh. For
example, Deputy Defense Minister Manvel Grigorian, who is also a
leader of Yerkrapah, the influential organization of the Karabakh war
veterans, recently spoke out against the return of occupied
territories. “We have no lands to cede,” Grigorian said at a
Yerkrapah meeting May 8.

Editor’s Note: Haroutiun Khachatrian is a Yerevan-based writer
specializing in economic and political affairs.