ArmInfo.The results of the meeting in Brussels between the leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan, Nikol Pashinyan and Ilham Aliyev, with the participation of the President of the European Council, Charles Michel, were expected, as they were a continuation of the results of the Prague meeting on
October 6 last year, where it was already announced that Armenia and Azerbaijan recognize each other's territorial integrity based on the 1991 Almaty Declaration. Political analyst Yervand Bozoyan, stated in an interview with the fifth Armenian TV channel.
Bozoyan, referring to the opinion of international observers, noted the diplomatic victory of Ilham Aliyev, who received a significant positional advantage on this diplomatic track. In fact, only two or three points remained unresolved, after the agreement of which it will be possible to conclude a peace treaty.
The political scientist stressed that after the tripartite statement of the leaders of Armenia, Russia and Azerbaijan dated November 9, 2020, the foreign policy course chosen by Yerevan is completely incomprehensible, and therefore most of the Armenian society continues to be in a state of uncertainty, which is intensified against the backdrop of internal troubles, when one part of society trusts the opposition, and the other part trusts the authorities. According to the analyst, after the defeat in the war, the Russian side advised Pashinyan not to discuss the topic of Nagorno-Karabakh in the negotiations, since in this case Yerevan would clearly suffer a diplomatic defeat. "The Russians are interested in keeping Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan in an indefinite status, and the Russian peacekeeping forces would continue their mission, which would allow Moscow to have a lever of influence on Baku," Bozoyan said.
However, Pashinyan nevertheless began his western negotiation track and agreed on the recognition of territorial integrity. The political scientist believes that the Prime Minister of Armenia did this because he had obligations both to the West and to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. To the latter he owes the preservation of power. In this context, referring to his personal conversation with one of the high-ranking Russian officials, the political scientist said that during the post-war opposition demonstrations, the head of the Turkish state, Erdogan, personally asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to give Pashinyan a second chance. The fears of the Russian side were related to the possibility of a new war if new forces came to power in Armenia. And the resumption of hostilities could lead to unwanted Russian-Turkish clashes. "The people of Armenia were also frightened by the possibility of a new war if the opposition came to power, and for this reason they voted in early parliamentary elections not for Pashinyan's party, but against the war," he said.
As a result, in the spring of 2022, Pashinyan opened the Overton's Window and the idea of lowering the bar of Artsakh's status emerged, which would allow to come to an agreement on peace with Azerbaijan. That is, what Turkey and most Western countries demanded of him.
And by September last year, Pashinyan was almost ready to give Karabakh to Azerbaijan, fearing at the same time the reaction of the Armenian society, constantly dragging out this issue, which, in turn, displeased Baku, which undertook a military provocation on September 11-12 last year, with intentions to put pressure on Yerevan.
Aliyev achieved his goal when in Prague on October 6, 2022, it was officially announced that the parties recognized the territorial integrity. This caused a certain shock in Moscow and in that part of the Armenian society that understood what was happening. "The Russians then answered this by saying that they cannot be greater Armenians than the Armenians themselves," the political scientist recalled, noting that Moscow's reaction was natural, since Pashinyan, working on two tracks - Western and Russian - preferred to actually go for major concessions in the West, which devalued the Russian negotiation track, which Azerbaijan no longer needs as unpromising.
Having recognized the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia, in fact, legitimized the blockade of the Lachin corridor, accepting that both Nagorno-Karabakh and Lachin are inalienable territories of Azerbaijan. The West really needed this in order to further destroy the legitimate bases for the presence of Russian peacekeeping forces in Karabakh. Thus, the West, represented by the United States, Great Britain, and Israel, gets the opportunity, firstly, to cut off Azerbaijan from the influence of Russia, and, secondly, to realize its serious geostrategic goals by creating a bridgehead against Iran from Azerbaijan.
According to Bozoyan, the West is currently conducting secret talks with Pashinyan over the withdrawal of Armenia from the CSTO, the withdrawal of 102 Russian military bases from Gyumri, and even the denunciation of the Armenian-Russian mutual assistance treaty. The West, at the same time, gives only verbal, and not institutional guarantees of the existential security of the Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh and the security of Armenia, and only if the country starts alliance relations with Turkey. To do so, Pashinyan demanded the existence of some kind of international platform where all these issues could be resolved. But Azerbaijan does not agree to this either, realizing that the leadership of Armenia, like Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia itself, are in a trap. These are the current bitter realities. Therefore, the political scientist sees the change of power in Armenia as the only way out of the current dangerous impasse.
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