NAGORNO-KARABAKH: BETWEEN VOTE AND REALITY

Open Democracy, UK
Dec 14 2006

Nagorno-Karabakh has followed Transdniestria and South Ossetia
in holding an independence referendum. But democracy in these
"non-recognised entities" is not so simple, reports Sabine Freizer
of the International Crisis Group.

On 10 December 2006, Nagorno-Karabakh held a referendum in which
close to 75,000 people, or 83% of voters, approved the entity’s
first constitution. The document calls Nagorno-Karabakh a "sovereign
democratic" state. The date of its approval is significant: the poll
took place fifteen years to the day after the mountainous Caucasian
enclave’s Armenian population voted overwhelmingly for independence.

But neither the 1991 referendum nor that of 2006 is recognised as
legitimate abroad. Nagorno-Karabakh may have been establishing
state-like institutions since 1991, but it continues to be
internationally considered as part of Azerbaijan, and no state –
not even Armenia – has ever recognised its statehood.

The long-running Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is the most significant
obstacle to peace and regional cooperation in the south Caucasus.

Fighting from 1992 to 1994, when a ceasefire came into effect, caused
at least 30,000 deaths and over a million Azeris and Armenians were
displaced. Ceasefire violations and casualties continue to occur
monthly along the line of contact. Exiles from Nagorno-Karabakh and
seven other occupied territories around the enclave have been unable
to return to their homes and continue to live in miserable conditions
elsewhere in Azerbaijan.

Today, Nagorno-Karabakh’s de facto authorities demand independence
and international recognition, citing their right to national
self-determination. Azerbaijan pledges that Nagorno-Karabakh’s
population will be provided with the highest form of self-government
but within the country’s frontiers. It claims the sanctity of
international borders and its right to preserve its territorial
integrity. It also blames Armenia for supporting Nagorno-Karabakh
militarily and economically, in effect participating in the annexation
of Azerbaijani land.

A year of stasis

Since 1992, Azerbaijan and Armenia have been negotiating to find a
solution. Talks have been facilitated by the Organisation for Security
and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Minsk group, chaired by France, Russia
and the United States. In 1997, 1998 and 2001 it seemed as though the
sides were close to agreeing on a comprehensive settlement. However,
each time, hopes were dashed.

The same occurred in 2006. Two summit meetings between Azerbaijani
president Ilham Aliyev and Armenian president Robert Kocharian were
held in the first half of the year. The two were supposed to sign
a short agreement on principles to launch more substantial talks on
the details of a full accord. They failed to do so. In the summer,
the Minsk group co-chairs expressed their deep frustration, issuing
a hard-hitting statement announcing they saw no point in continuing
their intensive shuttle diplomacy or initiating further meetings
between the presidents. They called on both leaders to summon the
political will necessary to clinch a deal and sell it to their deeply
sceptical publics.

Despite the difficulties, the building blocks of the potential
settlement are well-known. The International Crisis Group spelled
them out in two reports in 2005, and the mediators’ summer statement
confirmed the details: all sides would renounce the use of force;
Armenian troops would withdraw from parts of Azerbaijan surrounding
Nagorno-Karabakh; displaced persons would be allowed to return; and
both sides would commit to holding a referendum – whose results would
be recognised by all – in Nagorno-Karabakh on final status, with the
participation of Karabakh Armenians and Azeris. In the meantime, the
entity would have an interim status, and the international community
would provide substantial assistance, including peacekeepers – for
this, the only "frozen conflict" in Europe without international
monitors.

The Montenegro example

In a surprise turnaround after a brief meeting between the Azerbaijani
and Armenian presidents on the sidelines of the CIS summit in Minsk
on 28 November, President Aliyev optimistically declared, "we are
approaching the final stage" of the negotiations process. Azerbaijani
foreign minister Elmar Mammadyarov added that only one matter remains
a source of disagreement.

What could this be? In the past, negotiations have stalled over
several issues, including the future of two land corridors linking
Nagorno-Karabakh with Armenia (Lachin and Kelbajar), and the
modalities of the future referendum and its conditioning on refugee
return. After the Minsk meeting, Aliyev also stated "Azerbaijan’s
negotiating position remains unchanged." As Baku has refused to
consider granting Nagorno-Karabakh any status outside Azerbaijan,
the remaining sticking-point in the negotiations is likely to be
the modalities of the referendum; and more specifically whether it
would allow Nagorno-Karabakh to gain independence and international
recognition or not.

(On 5 December 2006 the OSCE ministerial council issued a statement
on Nagorno-Karabakh saying: "we are encouraged that negotiations
in 2006… have brought the sides closer to agreement on the basic
principles for the resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict…We
urge the Presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan to redouble their
efforts in the coming year to finalise these basic principles as soon
as possible.")

Allowing Nagorno-Karabakh to hold an internationally accepted
referendum on its future status, with the participation of Karabakh
Azeris and Armenians, is a key element in any resolution to the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Such a deal would be comparable to what
Serbia agreed to in signing the Belgrade agreement in 2002, which
created the "State Union of Serbia and Montenegro". A clause was
inserted into the Belgrade agreement stating that Montenegro could
begin independence procedures in 2006, culminating in a referendum.

During those four years, Montenegro did not waste time: it set
up a multi-ethnic government, established good relations with its
neighbours, founded a self-sufficient economy, engaged in a serious
fight against organised crime, strengthened the rule of law, and began
"stabilisation and association" talks with the European Union.

Most importantly, it obtained Belgrade’s consent that if 55% of
Montenegro residents voted in favour of independence, Serbia would
accept the result. When the referendum was held on 21 May 2006, all
sides had agreed on its modalities and pro- and anti-independence
groups were given equal rights to campaign.

Montenegro’s successful referendum has helped launch a series of
copycat efforts in non-recognised entities in the post-Soviet space,
including the breakaway Moldovan region of Transdniestria, South
Ossetia (a splinter of Georgia), and now Nagorno-Karabakh. On 17
September, Transdniestria voted on independence. It was followed by
presidential elections the same weekend as Nagorno-Karabakh’s vote.

On 12 November, two parallel referendums were organised in South
Ossetia, one backed by the de facto authorities in the breakaway
capital of Tskhinvali, the other by Tbilisi. In the first, South
Ossetians voted overwhelmingly for independence; in the second, voters
called for a resumption of dialogue with Georgia on the creation of
a federal state. Two parallel presidential elections were also held.

Amongst the region’s non-recognised entities, only Abkhazia has
abstained from the holding a referendum on independence in 2006.

According to Abkhazia’s de facto minister of foreign affairs, Sergei
Shamba, it has no need to repeat an exercise it already held in 1999.

At that time, a referendum adopting the constitution of Abkhazia as a
"sovereign, democratic and legally based state" passed with a large
majority of current Abkhazia residents, though it failed to include
those forced to flee the province during the 1992-93 war, and the
vote was never recognised internationally.

These post-Soviet referenda, like Nagorno-Karabakh on 10 December,
are in no way comparable to Montenegro’s. They did not meet the same
conditions: most importantly, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Moldova never
gave their consent for them to occur. The Azerbaijani ministry of
foreign affairs said that the Nagorno-Karabakh referendum "interferes
with an ongoing peace process", and the vote could not be considered
legitimate until the area’s ethnic Azeris were able to return.

An agreement for all

But there is another aspect to the Nagorno-Karabakh vote. It was
after all a referendum on a constitution, a basic law which will
govern the state, help assure democracy and human-rights protection.

In an interview with the Associated Press, Nagorno-Karabakh’s de
facto deputy foreign minister Masis Mayilian suggested that the
constitutional referendum was "necessary to formalise the already
existing foundations of state system and relations between the state
and its citizens." As a vote on how self-government will be temporarily
exercised in Nagorno-Karabakh until there is a comprehensive settlement
to the conflict, the referendum has at least internal legitimacy
and utility.

Since the early 1990s, Nagorno-Karabakh, Abkhazia, South Ossetia
and Transdniestria have been left in limbo, isolated from the
outside word, unsure of their future, with few contacts to their
former metropolitan states. De facto authorities have been elected,
have set up governmental institutions, have started providing social
services, have organised defence forces, have tried to restart local
economies, and in the Abkhaz case, have even allowed some 40,000
Georgian returnees and adopted the language of international minority
rights protection. They should not be blamed for refusing to allow the
lack of progress in international negotiations, especially on status,
to stall democratisation and reform in their entities.

Ultimately, the people still living in Nagorno-Karabakh and the other
non-recognised entities are better served by accountable government
protecting the rule of law (according to the Freedom House Index,
for example, Nagorno-Karabakh ranks as "partly free"). Only if they
can demonstrate commitment to democratic values will the de facto
authorities in Stepanakert, Sukhumi, Tskhinvali and Tiraspol be treated
as legitimate partners in negotiations. It is also in the best interest
of the international community and the metropolitan states to have
responsible leaders in the entities to defuse instability and join in
dialogue. Participatory and pluralist politics in the non-recognised
entities will help build the peace constituency essential to the
eventual implementation of any peace settlement.

But what of the Karabakh Azeris, who were unable to participate on
10 December in deciding the future of Nagorno-Karabakh’s internal
arrangements? According to international norms, these former
inhabitants of Nagorno-Karabakh should not be deprived of their right
to participate in the entity’s political life.

If Stepanakert wants to be gain legitimacy, it needs to show the
international community not only that it can organise orderly and
fair referendums, but also that it allows all those who should be
eligible to vote to actually cast their ballots. In other words,
they must begin to accept the return of the 40,000 Karabakh Azeris
who were forced to flee in 1991-92.

aucasus/nagorno_reality_4184.jsp

From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress