POLITICAL ANALYST: IT IS NOT WORTHY TO SEARCH FOR PRO-WESTERN OR PRO-RUSSIAN FORCES IN ARMENIA

Regnum, Russia
May 24 2007

Russia’s activity in the post-Soviet territory, particularly, in South
Caucasus has not born significant results, head of international
relations department at the Institute for Political and Military
Analysis (Russia) Sergey Markedonov told reporters today in Yerevan.

A REGNUM correspondent quotes him as saying that Russia has been
active in energy policy and in this connection discussion of Russian
energy imperialism started. Moreover, last year was a year of tough
pressure upon Georgia and Armenia as well, if we remember the twice
increase of the gas tariffs, and tough pressure upon Azerbaijan by
the end of the year, noted Markedonov. However, such activity turned
out to be ineffective, as it was grounded upon several erroneous
concepts. In particular, one of the concepts is the conviction that
work must be done with authorities only and the rest political elite
poses no interest, because there are common partners in power and it
is necessary to work with them.

The second aspect is inadequate fear of "color revolutions" and
unwillingness to be more pragmatic in finding a real corridor of
opportunities in cooperation. "The Russian policy increased the level
of mythological, as one can dislike Saakashvili as much as one can,
but one cannot say he is a US puppet and it is impossible to deal with
him; it is not true," Markedonov said adding that it does not mean
that "Abkhazia should be presented on a platter, however, there are
other spheres – economy and joint protection of the Chechen-Dagestani
section of the border."

"Everything is changing, and the dynamics should be taken into
account," said Markedonov adding that one should not be looking
for pro-Western or pro-Russian forces in Armenia: "There are only
pro-Armenian forces in Armenia and they will be using Russia and the
West in their national interests."