BAKU/YEREVAN
Six months after their nearly 30-year war ended with Azerbaijan routing Armenian forces in a six-week lightning strike, tensions have risen anew.
Acting Armenian PM Nikol Pashinyan, who faces a snap election in July with a huge lead in opinion polls, alleged Azerbaijani forces had crossed more than 3 km into Armenia in the sensitive Syunik area. In addition, Yerevan accused of fomemting tensions along another section of the frontier, the northern international border area near Georgia.
“This is an encroachment into Armenian territory,” Pashinyan told the country’s Security Council. He said Yerevan would resolve the issue through negotiations. Armenia has little choice but to negotiate-its army was decimated during the war’s final phase, pummelled by high-tech Azerbaijani weapons which over-ran old-style Armenian trenches.
On May 14, Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry said Armenia was making a molehill out of a mountain, and that Azerbaijani border units were merely establishing posts along the often poorly defined border between the two countries.
Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry said that Armenia was over-reacting.
“It is surprising that the Armenian side has reacted inadequately to this process and is making provocative statements”, said Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry.
According to the statement, Azerbaijani Border Guard Service officials arrived at the site on May 12 and are negotiating with the Armenian side and steps are being taken to normalize the situation.
“We recommend Armenian political and military circles not to panic, to recognize the reality of the interstate border regime in the Azerbaijani districts of Zangilan, Gubadli, Lachin, and Kelbajar, and to avoid exacerbating the situation in the region. Azerbaijan is committed to reducing tensions and encourages the other side to do the same ” the Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry said.
MACRON À L’AVANT!
While Moscow has been cautious, French President Immanueal Macron seems intent on beefing up his waning credentials. Considering the far-away conflict for Paris, such harsh statements for Azerbaijan to “withdraw” from the little areas where there is disagreement on Friday was befuddling.
Macron, using Facebook, insisted Azerbaijani troops “withdraw” from Armenia, though it is far from clear what he meant. “Azerbaijani troops entered the Armenian territory. They must return immediately,” he said with no explanation. The Paris chief even posted a quote in Armenian, though he has no known command of that language. “France has supported and will continue to support the Armenian people”, he added.
Even French diplomats have admitted in the past that the large Armenian diaspora in that country could not be ignored as an electoral force. Therefore, Baku continues to insist that the EU or another entity replace France, citing bias.
On Friday many Baku commentators speculated Azerbaijan may have reached the limits of its patience and may simply cut ties with France. Aliyev has said this on many occasions but refrained, but this time Macron may have miscalculated.
On the evening of May 13, Macron also discussed this topic during a telephone conversation with the acting Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, but did not bother with Azerbaijan’s leadership. “France stands for the settlement of the tense situation in the region. This would ensure regional stability and security,” said the press service of the Elysee Palace.
Some observers have evaluated Macron’s obcession with the issue as obscurantist histrionics about settling scores with co-NATO member Turkey. France has sometimes, for example, supported the Libyan warlord General Khalifa Haftar, who oppsoses the UN backed Tripoli government which Ankara backs. France has, to put it mildly, a complicated if not by some locals despised track record in its former colonies from Africa to Vietnam.
And of course, Macron – for electoral purposes – needs to bolster his record as being tough on “Muslims” – although Azerbaijan is highly secular and the conflict had and has almost nothing to do with religion.
MOSCOW CAUTION
Russia offered no military help during the long war’s dying days despite Armenia being a member of Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) led by Moscow.
Moscow declined to intervene, noting the fighting was occurring on territory internationally regarded as part of Azerbaijan.
But Armenia on May 13 again appealed to the CSTO to take measures.
According to Yerevan, 240 servicemen of the Azerbaijani army are on the territory of Armenia in the Syunik and Gegharkunik regions.
“The CSTO is closely following the development of the situation in the border regions of the Syunik region of Armenia. As the situation develops, if necessary, actions will be taken under the provisions of the Collective Security Treaty and the CSTO Charter”, the CSTO press service said.
After Yerevan’s appeal to Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov. The Russian foreign ministry issued a statement for the sides to adhere to November’s agreement at ending hostilities.
Armenia charges that 0n the night of May 12, up to 200 Azerbaijani soldiers advanced their positions in the direction of the Syunik region of Armenia. But there were no reports of violence.
Nonetheless, there were statements of concern by foreign countries. “We are closely following reports of increased tensions along a non-demarcated portion of the Armenia-Azerbaijan border,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Ned Price tweeted Thursday afternoon.
“We understand communication between the parties is ongoing and urge restraint in de-escalating the situation peacefully.”
On Friday, Yerevan formally asked the CSTO, of which Armenia is a member, to intervene.
ANALYSTS DISMISS INCIDENT AS A POLITICAL TACTIC
Despite the typical loud complaints and ominous warnings from Yerevan, analysts contacted by The Tribune all agreed there was virtually no chance of a resumption of large-scale hostilities.
A Russian-brokered deal stopped the war in an effective Armenian capitulation and Kremlin troops moved in as peacekeepers after the six-week bloodbath.
Given the Russian presence, as well as that of military observers from Turkey, the key Azerbaijani ally which helped build its military over 20 years, as part of a joint Moscow-Ankara monitoring centre in the former occupied territories, analysts who spoke to The Tribune said they believed wide-scale violence was extremely unlikely.
AZERBAIJANI OBJECTIVES
Baku in recent days has displayed impatience with statements by some officials in Yerevan that it would not allow for an agreed transit corridor between Azerbaijan and its Nakhchivan exclave on the Iranian border. And by some ultra natioanlists that Armenia, somehow, would retake land they lost but long occupied.
The sides agreed under the 2020 peace deal to reopen transport links in the area. But the issue is a sensitive one in Armenia since such rail and road links would cross through a narrow band of its territory.
The area of the alleged incursion is exactly in this vicinity and also includes a major water reservoir.
But few analysts on either side believe seriously that Baku has any intention of holding onto a tiny slice or two of Armenian territory.
Rather, they say, the objective is likely to eliminate any chance of intransigence by Armenia on the issue of the vital corridor, which would essentially end Nakhichevan’s isolation.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev has been unequivocal in warning Armenia not to dawdle with the opening of transport links closed for almost three decades. Or, have some Armenian hard-liners have hinted, say they will avenge their losses.
He said this week in an interview with state TV that “very serious steps have been taken…at the level of the deputy prime ministers of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Russia. I can with confidence say that the rail corridor will be opened.
But his impatience was visceral, even palpable.
On 13th May, military negotiations between the sides reportedly took place near the area of unrest, disputed Lake Sevlich (Garagel). But according to local Armenian officials, there have been no results.
Acting PM Pashinyan said on 13th May that the confrontation was not a military escalation, as there were no shootings or skirmishes, but instead a “pre-planned provocation”.
One diplomat who served for years in the region said that such incidents were bound to continue for years, though the official also expressed extreme doubt that any new major hostilities could be contemplated, given that Azerbaijan is fully supported by powerful NATO ally Turkey – in addition to the Russian peacekeeping presence.
For Moscow to allow its mission to falter would be a diplomatic failure of epic proportions in a region where it is struggling to retain its long-time geopolitical dominance.
The Russian peace-keeping contingent, despite the relatively minor breaches over the last two days, controls all major access points in the area around the former Azerbaijan’s former USSR Nagorno-Karabakh district.
The original conflict started there in 1988 with majority Armenians in the mountainous area of Azerbaijan demanding union with Armenia or independence, which was never recognized by a single country. Only an estimated 40,000 people remain there, and there is little economic activity.
But the war spread considerably further by 1993-1994, when Armenian forces went far beyond their original goal and occupied seven more districts of Azerbaijan, ethnically cleansing more than 600,000 people in the process despite four unanimous U.N. Security Council resolutions for Armenian forces to quit.
ALIYEV SAYS WAR IS OVER, DISMISSING REMAINING ISSUES
Aliyev also expressed anger at suggestions the conflict was somehow not over.
Some long-time analysts and diplomats suggest Azerbaijan’s Nagorno-Karabakh does not have any “formal status” – and is still partially controlled by Armenian separatists, though these increasingly marginal forces are powerless to do anything except make provocative statements.
Aliyev said all this was a moot point, as the unrecognised self-declared parts of the entity are internationally recognised as part of Azerbaijan, despite what the locals call the area or what pronouncements are made either there or in Armenia.
“Once again, I want to say, after the war, I have repeatedly said the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is resolved, he said.”
“Victory on the battlefield forced the enemy to raise a white flag and surrender,” he continued, adding the November 10 agreement was not a cease-fire, but an end to hostilities. “There is no territorial unit in Azerbaijan called Nagorno-Karabakh. “The conflict is resolved, and I think to return to this question is useless.”
“If someone thinks the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict is not settled it’s their problem,” Aliyev continued, evidently referring to some diplomats and analysts.
The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which led an unsuccessful 30-year mediating effort between the sides was hamstrung by an unclear mandate. It came in for special criticism over the years by Baku as dysfunctional, biased, and clunky.
But since the conflict ended, Aliyev has been especially harsh and in rather blunt language ruminated as to why the mediating group still exists. The OSCE “Minsk Group” mediating format – named after the city where it was set up in 1992, is now relegated to much more minor issues like a few odd POW cases.