WHAT EFFECT WILL THE MEETING BETWEEN ARMENIAN, AZERBAIJANI AND RUSSIAN PRESIDENTS HAVE?
Karine Ter-Sahakyan

PanARMENIAN.Net
23.10.2008 GMT+04:00

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has always been a format of rivalry
between Russia and the United States.

Russian President Dmitri Medvedev’s Yerevan statement on his intention
to invite the Armenian and Azerbaijani Presidents to Moscow for the
regulation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict was not an unexpected
move. After the August events it became clear to everyone in the Region
that Russia would not content itself with Â"compelling Georgia to
peaceÂ"; there would also be other steps directed to the consolidation
of cracked Russian positions in the South Caucasus.

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ That Russian positions cracked in the Region is
quite a fact, and the regional states will hardly seek repetition of
the Georgian scenario. Especially at the time of financial-economic
crisis the policy of twisting arms, which, by the way, neither
bypassed Russia, cannot lead us to a silent consent with the Russian
viewpoint. However strange it may sound, Armenia found itself in a more
advantageous position than Georgia or Azerbaijan. It has neither oil,
nor passage to the Black Sea, but it has a great desire to settle the
Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with minimal losses. Now we shall not dwell
on the fact that doing it behind the back of Nagorno Karabakh is not
ethical at all. That’s not the point. Yerevan has simply received a
certain impulse and a little freedom of manipulation in the painful
issue. Now the future of the Nagorno Karabakh Republic and that of
Armenia itself depend on how Armenia will make use of the situation,
and Yerevan cannot but realize the real value of the moment.

The Region is changing rapidly, and quite soon we shall have to
deal with a fairly new South Caucasus. It presupposes new relations
too: Russia-South Caucasus, USA-South Caucasus, and Turkey-South
Caucasus. As for the Karabakh conflict, it has always been a format of
rivalry between Russia and the United States. This rivalry has always
existed, but it has become more intense now, and the latest events are
the proof of it: the Washington meeting of Armenian Prime-Minister
Tigran Sargsyan with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, the
one-day visit of US Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Fried, and
before it – visit of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. However,
Russia faces a serious problem after the Â"five-day warÂ": its image
has been thoroughly destroyed in the eyes of the world community, and
now Russia has to prove that militant solution of the South Ossetian
and Abkhazian conflict was just an exception and that the Russian
Federation is potent enough to solve its problems in some other ways
too, i.e. through negotiations. "The events of August 2008 have created
a new platform for the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. Azerbaijan will never
become a completely pro-western country, like Georgia is. Moreover,
the latter has been disvalued as an oil and gas transit country and
the world powers have given a fresh look at Armenia, whose ‘football
diplomacy’ produced the desired effect. Turkey had started developing
its Caucasus stability and cooperation pact still in spring of the
current year and the five-day war in South Ossetia just pushed Ankara
to action. Thus, the Turkish initiative has not only played its role
in the Armenian-Azerbaijani relations, but it has also changed the
whole situation in the region," considers political analyst Sergey
Minasyan. Minasyan also notes Russia’s Â"strangeÂ" intention to speed
up the Nagorno-Karabakh process. "Presently Russia is imitating the
Ramboullet and Bucharest scenarios. However, for the conflicting
sides maintenance of the status quo and assistance from the U.S. and
EU is more preferable. I am not sure that speeding up the process is
in Russia’s interests," Minasyan says.

According to Head of the Russian Duma Defence Committee Viktor
Zavarzin, the intended meeting between Armenian, Azerbaijani and
Russian Presidents will convey a new impulse to the Karabakh talks
and will help to ease the stress in the Region. "Resolution of the
conflict is possible only on the negotiation level with observation of
international norms, and it should satisfy all the interested parties,"
Zavarzin concluded.

One point, however, remains incomprehensible – how is it possible to
satisfy all the interested parties of the conflict?

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