CONFIDENCE ON THE FRAUD
Leonid Martirosyan

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31-07-2009

"I am ready to take in the hands a weapon in order to reconquer
Shushi". Dear reader, try to guess from three times to whom
belong these words, which return by the spirit of militarism and
revanchism. Don’t you guess? We will help you. Such statement made
nobody else but… the Ambassador of Azerbaijan in Russia Polad
Bulbul Oglu.

Yes, the one who in early July together with his Armenian
Colleague Armen Smbatyan and Russian Federation President’s Special
Representative for International Cultural Cooperation Mikhail Shvydkoi,
as well as representatives of parliaments and the communities of
the two South Caucasus states arrived in Nagorno Karabakh. Moreover,
he arrived not as a tourist, but with the mission… of friendship
and peace. With the intention, according to his words, which he said
in NK, "to establish confidence between the peoples, to give people
an opportunity to communicate with each other". It must be admitted
that even during the stay of the Azerbaijani Ambassador in Karabakh,
we doubted the sincerity of his words, and evidently, we did not
make a mistake. Since his desire to reconquer Shushi "the peacemaker"
Bulbul Oglu announced to "the hail and the world" only a week later
after he had left the NKR.

In this connection, the question arises about the expedience and the
effectiveness of people diplomacy. Of course, not a public diplomacy,
as such, namely, in partnership with Azerbaijan, within the framework
of which all sorts of intermediaries call the conflicting parties
to build bridges of trust. Then they are surprised, why there are no
visible results. Strictly speaking, at what may we be surprised? Now we
are not going to speak about that with the so-called public diplomacy
Azerbaijan is trying to cover its political goals, camouflaging its by
"peacemaking" phraseology and to belittle the statues of the NKR as an
independent state, presenting the Azeri-Karabakh dialogue as a contact
of two communities. It is a question of something another. About that
the first condition of the public diplomacy, mission of friendship is
the sincerity of both thoughts and affairs. Alas, Azerbaijan suffers
from a lack of both. Moreover, it has suffered for a long time, which
is confirmed by an unsuccessful experience of the public diplomacy
of the past years.

It is remembered as early as 2001 under the aegis of the OSCE a group
of Azerbaijani journalists arrived in NK who should have to get into
contact with their Karabakhian colleagues and on the return home to
present a real life in NK in their publications. And then the Azeris,
as now Polad Bulbul Oglu, pronounced beautiful words about friendship
and reconciliation. However, on the return to their homeland they
published a frank lie about NK having nothing in common with what
they had seen and about what they had spoken in NK. The same of them,
who refused to make a deal with their own conscience were persecuted
and had felt all "the delight" on their own back from the intercourse
of the special services. By the way, the Karabakhian journalist never
waited for the return visit.

Another example. Director of the Human Rights Center of Azerbaijan
Eldar Zeynalov in 2002 took part in a seminar held in Stepanakert,
under the aegis of the network of nongovernmental organizations
"Caucasian forum". Everything would not be so bad if he did not
permit himself an idea about that in NK the transition to the European
standards of the building a democratic civil society was obvious. You
may agree that to measures of Azerbaijan the thought is more than
seditious, so no, E. Zeynalov dared even to replicate it in his
interviews. As a result, the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Azerbaijan
qualified the trip of E. Zeynalov to Nagorno Karabakh as a "criminal",
the authorities and even the opposition, and also, as it would not
seem paradoxical, the colleagues of Eldar on the observance of the
law demanded to bring him to criminal liability for the parricide.

The office of Human Rights Center headed by E. Zeynalov was destroyed,
his wife and some human rights activists were undergone obstructions,
daring to raise a voice witness for the colleagues. But curiously,
at that time Ilham Aliyev joined the national persecution of the
famous human rights activist, at that time the deputy Milli Majlisi
and … vice president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of
Europe, who called tribesmen "to put an end to the accomplices of our
enemies". As you can see, everything changes in the sublunary world,
but not in Azerbaijan. Well, perhaps the status of I. Aliyev has
changed-the junior, from the vice-president of PACE to the president
of the country. And the essence of the policy against the Armenian
people – an aggressive, hateful, intolerant – has not been undergone
any transformation. Accordingly, the power, which has erected Armenian
phobia into the rank of a ruling state ideology, cannot allow anybody
to undermine the bases of this ideology. And consequently, such
people as Eldar Zeynalov, is considered to the parricide, as they
have encroached on the state doctrine of Azerbaijan, in accordance
with which Nagorno Karabakh must be presented to Azerbaijani society,
and to the world community exclusively in the black paints.

For the same reason official Baku applies the maximum efforts in
order to the extend of the possible to prevent the visits of the
representatives of foreign countries and international structures
to NK, who, God forbid, will express positive opinion about the
independent NKR. Based on principle "the less are the strangers’ eyes
so much the better". The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan
with vigilance of mythical hundred eyes Argus vigilantly follows
that disagreeable persons for Baku do not visit NK, but if such
nevertheless occurs, with energy and importunity, worthy of the best
application, sets up a howl, accompanied by the threats of the break
of relations with one or another "intractable" country. There is a
fresh example from this series- a recent visit to Nagorno Karabakh
of a deputy of the National Assembly of France, the leader of the
deputy group of the friendship France-Armenia Francois Rochebloine,
who caused serious passions in Azerbaijan. In connection with the
visit of parliamentarians in the NKR, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs
of Azerbaijan’s sent a note of protest to the Foreign Policy Department
of France. In turn, the Azerbaijani colleagues of Monsieur Rochebloine
came out with the requirement to exclude France from co-chairmanship
of the OSCE Minsk Group. It was not possible without the smile
to read the motivation of the behavior of Francois Rochebloine in
the interpretation of the head of the department of the external
connections of the president’s administration of Azerbaijan Novruz
Mamedov. In his opinion, "the parliamentarians such as F. Rochebloine
are those who fall under influence without knowing policy and regional
problems".

Thus, neither much nor less. I would like to recall the Azerbaijani
official, that only one list of political posts of Francois
Rochebloine, which ha has held in a period of long years and continues
to hold, is completely enough in order under their ponderability
to bury him alive, Novruz Mamedov, putting out himself as an ace of
politics. Of course, the reason for the Azeri hysteria is not in the
very visit of Francois Rochebloine. If he spoke about Nagorno Karabakh
and its people negatively in the spirit of the Azerbaijani propaganda,
Baku would welcome him, and perhaps even encouraged to visit us more
often. But the fact is that Francois Rochebloine allowed himself to
recognize behind the people of NK the right to self-determination.

Moreover, he spoke uncomplimentary about the Azerbaijani regime saying
the following: "We cannot trust the State, which declares its desire
for peace and at the same time comes out with martial statements. We
cannot trust the State, the representatives of which-I mean the two
presidents; the father and the son- with hostility are disposed to
the most elementary public freedoms". Francois Rochebloine said,
in essence, that we, the Karabakhian people, have long been known –
Azerbaijan can not be trusted. And judging by everything, this mistrust
will be for a long time.

As between words and affairs of even the president of this country
is a deep precipice. Indeed, just a week before the arrival of the
peacekeeping mission in NK within the framework of the ambassadors
of Armenia and Azerbaijan in Russia, Ilham Aliyev said that "the war
has not finished yet, its first stage was finished, and we always
have to be ready to free our native land from the enemies by armed
forces". What, however, did not prevent him at the meeting with a
team of peacekeepers in Baku to declaim the need of restoring the
confidence between the peoples. Or. The members of the Azerbaijani
delegation visited Shushi and saw with its own eyes that the Persian
mosque stands in soundness and safety, and even photographed against
its background. This, however, again did not prevent Ilham Aliyev
to tell the press that it was in ruins. One must admit that the
restoration of trust between Armenians and Azeris has virtually
impossible. There are no objective conditions for this.

They also require an adequate perception of the parties by the
existing realities and an adequate understanding of the need to
build relationships based on mutual respect and mutual confidence,
awareness of the importance of work in the future. Do we need in the
people diplomacy, which the Azerbaijani part is used purely for their
own purposes, far from a sincere desire to establish a constructive
dialogue for a peaceful future for both people? The answer is more
than obvious. I think that the visits within the framework of the
people diplomacy will be possible when objective conditions are
appeared. And with them the conviction, that the relations will
be built on the honesty, which is called, "without the fraud". But
for now it does not work "without fraud", which is confirmed by the
readiness of the Ambassador "do not establish a confidence between
the people", but to take into the hands a weapon…