MEDIATORS HOLD THEIR SUCCESSIVE VICTORY
Vardan Grigoryan

Hayots Ashkhar Daily
Published on June10, 2008
Armenia

New Obstacles in the Negotiation Process

As was expected, during their first high-level meeting held in
St. Petersburg on June 6, Presidents Serge Sargsyan and Ilham
reiterated their willingness to continue the Karabakh peace talks in
the frameworks of the OSCE Minsk Group.

This means that the recent months’ propaganda uproar raised by the
Azerbaijani leadership for discontinuing the talks and finding a
military solution to the Karabakh conflict is devoid of serious
grounds, at least for the time being. The talks will continue even
during the presidential campaign expected in Azerbaijan. In this
connection, the Presidents of both countries have given relevant
recommendations to their Foreign Ministers.

So, the Co-Chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group will pay their regular visit
to the region in the course of the current month. What remains on the
table is the Madrid Principles submitted to the parties in November
2007; however, they are subject to certain changes.

The upcoming talks will be conducted by the two countries’ Foreign
Ministers, whereas the Presidents will take a certain "break" which
will enable Mr. Aliev to bring the presidential campaign to an end. The
newly elected President of Armenia will, in turn, have the opportunity
to tackle the country’s internal problems.

Thus, the two Presidents’ meeting-acquaintance was a success. Although,
it couldn’t have been otherwise for two main reasons:

First: Serge Sargsyan is a new person in the Karabakh settlement talks
only in a formal sense, because having been the Defense Minister and
the Prime Minister of Armenia, he has been thoroughly aware of the
process and the results of the talks.

Second: The task of resuming the Karabakh settlement talks and
maintaining or changing the Minsk Group format is actually beyond
the powers of Armenia or Azerbaijan.

With its "internationalized" nature, the Karabakh conflict is on the
top of all the problems existing in the region, therefore the issue
of introducing fundamental changes in its format cannot be solved
on the level of the two countries only. Despite their recent months’
attempts of blackmailing the Armenian party and even the international
community, Azerbaijan and its leader cannot but take into consideration
that comprehensible fact.

A question arises as to whether this means that the Karabakh peace
process will reach a new deadlock again and, unable to coordinate
the contrary attitudes of the parties, the mediators will have to
force them to negotiate and search for new possibilities for mutual
concessions.

Obviously, this is what is going to happen by the end of the year since
Azerbaijan and the United States are to hold presidential elections
in that period. However, the serious probability of reviewing the
superpowers’ attitudes towards such issues of international and
regional importance as the deployment of a new American antimissile
system in Europe, the fate of the "Nabukko" program and the US
policy in relation to Iran becomes an agenda issue. And finally, the
exacerbated confrontation between Russia and the West in relation to
the Abkhazian issue may play a certain role as a precedent.

The probability that the superpowers may change their attitude towards
those issues first of all depends on the US presidential elections
and hence – the prospect of the Russian-American relations.

Thus, having initiated its recent campaign against Armenia, the
Azerbaijani leadership managed, as a matter of fact, to solve only
one problem, i.e. to prevent the attempts of applying the Kosovo
precedent to our region.

The only obstacle our country may face in the near future in terms
of receiving a "freedom of hands" in the solution of the Karabakh
conflict is the possible destabilization of Armenia’s internal
political situation. Here is Armenia’s "Achilles tendon" which, if
cut to the quick, may deprive the country of the precious time to
recover internally and strengthen the foreign policy activeness in
the Karabakh settlement process in such an important period of time
as the second half of 2008.

Therefore, in view of the extremely complex and contradictory
international-political processes following the St. Petersburg meeting,
the pro-Armenian solution of the Karabakh issue will become dependant
upon the freedom of Armenia and the Armenian diplomacy of responding
to those processes in time and in a proper manner.