Lragir, Armenia
Jan 18 2008

PROPOSALS IN HAND AND ISSUES UNDER FEET

We should thank the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs who continue to come
to the region with joy on their faces, cheerful and full of life, to
resolve the Karabakh issue, and keep their external freshness for the
sake of the Armenian and Azerbaijani peoples for them not to have
even a crumb of doubt that no resolution of the issue can be
achieved. These people are tired of the airports of Yerevan and
Azerbaijan, Armenian and Azerbaijani reporters to whom the Karabakh
reporters sometimes join, they are tired of the Armenian and
Azerbaijani cuisines to which sometimes the Karabakh cuisine adds,
they are tired of leaving Yerevan and Baku, especially that sometimes
they also have to leave Karabakh. Perhaps this monotone is the reason
that this time the co-chairs visited the line of contact to
experience at least something new, appear in a little new
environment, otherwise airport, hotel or embassy, presidential
offices, restaurant, embassy, airport, home. Perhaps they feel
inconvenient before the Armenian and Azerbaijani societies, and when
they say they offer the best resolution they can, they mean that they
are not protracting the resolution to prolong their mission but the
conflict sides protract the resolution with their tough stance.

Nevertheless, we must be grateful to the presidents of the conflict
sides who consistently disagree with the good, the best and the
perfect proposals. The point is that the limit of human abilities is
unknown, and these abilities are usually discovered in extreme
situations when there is no way out and the human potential is used,
and such solutions are found which would remain asleep in man in
normal situations. And if now the co-chairs say they are proposing
the best option they can to help resolve the conflict through
compromise, there is no need to yield to their human despair. It is
necessary to discover the superman inside them, which Robert
Kocharyan and Ilham Aliyev have probably done, and it is necessary to
continue to reject their proposals to push the co-chairs to conceive
new proposals and offer them. It is necessary to place them in
extremities all the time to have them give birth to the best
proposals until they achieve perfection. The perfection will be a
resolution without a compromise, meeting the interests of Armenia,
Karabakh and Azerbaijan.

Now it seems practically impossible to reach such a resolution.
However, there is no need to draw hasty conclusions. Do you remember
what the co-chairs stated a few years ago? They said they had run out
of imagination. However, if turned out that they had not. At least in
Madrid a new proposal was offered to the sides, which is already
considered as the best. What would happen if Armenia, Azerbaijan and
Karabakh felt desperate after the co-chairs had stated to run out of
imagination, and accepted the proposal. In that case, we would not
have the proposal which is considered as `the best that can be
offered’. No doubt, through the complicated and psychological game of
the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan the co-chairs, maybe
unintentionally, will offer a lot of best options. Even they are
unaware of their capabilities.

HAKOB BADALYAN