THE SETTLEMENT PROCESS YET FAR FROM FINISH-LINE
Lilit Poghosyan
Azat Artsakh Daily
06 Dec 08
Republic of Nagorno Karabakh [NKR]
So, the session of the Council of the Foreign Ministers of
OSCE member states launched on December 4 in Helsinki and the
"optimistic" predictions to make the regular meeting in Minsk Group
Co-Chairmen-Nalbandyan-Mamedyarov format previewed in the before
mentioned framework historical and crucial, didn’t go beyond "kind
wishes".
Though OSCE Chairman in office Alexander Strub hurried (or maybe hoped
to preview to coming events), to announce that the Helsinki meeting
of the Foreign Ministers of OSCE member states will most probably
be marked by the adoption of the declaration on Nagorno Karabakh,
nothing fatal happened in Helsinki.
The "political and politological" circles that take at face value the
announcements made by Azerbaijani and western officials over again
became confident that not to appear in ridiculous situation it would
be helpful to trust our local authorities as well. In this special case
the conversation is about Armenian Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandyan,
who, in the person of the Spokesman for the Foreign Ministry have
unequivocally refuted the rumors about the adoption of the declaration.
With their joint announcement the representatives of Minsk Group
Co-Chairmen countries, the Russian, French Foreign Ministers and
the US Deputy Secret ary of State one more time enshrined that
"Karabakh Conflict can’t have military settlement and they called
the two parties to make efforts during the coming months "to finish
their work around the main principles of the settlement and later
to set about the elaboration of the bill of a universal peace treaty
based on those principles" they reiterated their loyalty towards the
peaceful settlement of the conflict.
Nothing more.
Thus the Minsk Group reiterated something that was clear, at least
after the last visit of the Co-Chairman: that is to say it is not
possible to record any "breakthrough" in the settlement process, at
least at this refuge. The American Co-Chairman Mathew Brize, by the
way, quite realistically stated this. He said that the regular meeting
in the framework of Minsk Group was far not extraordinary. "It happened
because we all were here and we were expecting a breakthrough".
Of course, this time as well Brize remained loyal to the creation
of a public livelihood around him. Firstly he made the Azerbaijani
journalists happy, by saying that "the peace treaty must start
from territorial integrity because that principle works all over
the world. But the treaty can’t exist without the points about
self-determination."
To which Nalbandyan responded in a very rude manner: "I would like
to think that Brize hasn’t made similar ann ouncement, because it
doesn’t seem to be an announcement made on the level of a Co-Chairman,
but rather a person who is not interested in the right course of
the negotiations, who doesn’t want the negotiations to continue. I
hope he hasn’t made similar announcement, maybe he wanted to say
something else.
The American diplomat "justified" the hopes of the RA Foreign
Minister, as a rule over again refuted himself, saying that he
hasn’t said such a thing. What he really wanted to do was to make
the Azerbaijani journalists understand that while Ilham Aliev insists
on the principle of territorial integrity, Serge Sargsyan insists on
the right of self-determination. And that in this case the settlement
must be based on all the 3 Helsinki principles: territorial integrity,
nations’ right to self-determination and not using force.
It is noteworthy that only one of the before mentioned principals:
territorial integrity matches with Azerbaijan’s aspirations, the
other two: self-determination and not using force comply with the
stance of the Armenian party.
Thus the Helsinki process gave nothing new to the two parties or to
the Co-Chairmen.
The only new thing expressed by the joint announcement made by the
Foreign Ministers of the Co-Chairman countries was the exhortation
addressed to the parties to withdraw the snipers from the conflict zone
as a manifestation of mutual trust, to save the lives of the innocent
people and the soldiers and to establish stable cease-fire regime."
We must underscore that this clause is addressed to Azerbaijan –
if not absolutely at least mainly. Because it is Azerbaijan that
time after time makes provocative actions in Armenian-Azerbaijani
contact line. It is Azerbaijan that stubbornly hinders the efforts
of the international community to hold monitoring linked with the
breaching of the ceasefire. It is Azerbaijan’s President that makes
bellicose announcements recording with pride that Moscow declaration
is far not an obstacle for re-starting military actions.
If we add to all the before mentioned the "autonomous" announcement
made by RF Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov saying that the Moscow
declaration gave a powerful signal to the settlement process of
Karabakh conflict, then it becomes clear that the Foreign Ministers
of OSCE member states and the Minsk Group Co-Chairmen confessed their
powerlessness in Helsinki to bring closer the diametrically different
approaches of the two sides, around the document enshrining the main
principles, which will be acceptable for the Co-Chairmen as well.
For the simple reason that besides Karabakh status and Azerbaijan’s
territorial integrity they are mainly interested in deploying
peacekeeping forces, the before mentioned is simply insolvable because
of Russia-USA rivalry.
And the fact that Karabakh is estranged from Minsk Group process and
as Brize underscored it is not yet known when it will be "formally"
involved in the negotiation format proves that the negotiations are
far from the finish line.