WPS Agency, Russia
DEFENSE and SECURITY (Russia)
October 16, 2009 Friday
NAGORNO-KARABAKH AS KEY
by Yuri Simonjan
HIGHLIGHT: CONVERSATION BETWEEN PRESIDENTS OF RUSSIA AND ARMENIA WAS
CENTERED AROUND KARABAKH CONFLICT RESOLUTION; Presidents of Russia and
Armenia discussed Nagorno-Karabakh conflict resolution.
President of Armenia Serj Sargsjan visited Moscow on Dmitry Medvedev’s
invitation. According to the official press release, the two
presidents discussed bilateral and regional cooperation, partnership
in international alliances, and military, economic, and commercial
ties between our countries. Sources in Yerevan, however, said that the
talks were mostly focused on Karabakh conflict resolution.
Karabakh was all Sargsjan spoke about before boarding his plane for
Moscow. He plainly told journalists that he had never discussed
release of territories to Azerbaijan with its President Ilham Aliyev,
not even during their latest meeting in Kishinev, Moldova.
"We never discussed it with the president of Azerbaijan," Sargsjan
said. "Aliyev was displeased with the talks in Kishinev because we
only discussed two issues there, namely Karabakh’s eventual and
provisional status." The Armenian leader ducked the question if he was
going to Moscow to discuss Karabakh with Medvedev.
Russia’s interest in normalization of the Armenian-Azerbaijani
relations understandable. Success in this endeavor will strengthen its
positions in the region and abet its image of peacekeeper shattered by
the August 2008 events. The Armenian-Turkish rapprochement all but
left to the United States to promote, Russia retained initiative in
the Armenian-Azerbaijani settlement.
"Where the Armenian-Turkish relations are concerned, Russia keeps its
distance and merely observes the rapprochement," Stepan Grigorjan of
the Center for Globalization and Cooperation (Yerevan) said. Even
though it could hope to benefit from the strengthening of Armenia in
the region and Turkey’s weakening, Moscow was noticeably less anxious
to see the Armenian-Turkish border opened again than the United States
and Europe were. "In return for this non-involvement, Russia got
international community’s consent for remaining an active participant
in the Nagorno-Karabakh process. Its clout within the framework of the
OSCE Minsk Group may even grow now. It will play into the Armenians’
hands because the moment the Armenian-Turkish protocols were signed,
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara immediately "recalled"
Azerbaijani territorial integrity without whose restoration, he said,
there was no hope for the Turkish-Armenian normalization," Grigorjan
commented.
The political scientist suggested that Sargsjan and Medvedev were
going to try and decide how the Karabakh process might be accelerated
and formulate Russian interests in the matter.
"It is clear after all that Russia is interested in the military
component of the so far hypothetical peacekeeping operation in the
Nagorno-Karabakh Republic because it will expand Russian military
presence in the South Caucasus. Baku objects to it, of course. Neither
does Stepanakert want foreign military personnel in Nagorno-Karabakh
at this time."
According to the expert, Moscow will need all involved parties’
consent to deploy Russian peacekeepers in the Nagorno-Karabakh
Republic and that necessitates negotiations with Turkey which will
finally start putting its political interests above sisterly relations
with Azerbaijan. "We have a whole bunch of related matters here, and
that precludes any acceleration of the Nagorno-Karabakh process,"
Grigorjan said.
Source: Nezavisimaya Gazeta, October 13, 2009, pp. 1, 6
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress