Monday, August 26 2013

Provision of the status of a European Union associate
member to Armenia may considerably complicate the relations between Azerbaijan
and Europe.  However, the process of
Armenia's European integration gives a common ground to Baku and Moscow and
contributes to qualitative improvement of the Azerbaijani-Russian relations,
Simon Manukian, a political expert from London, says in his interview with ArmInfo.   

 

According to the European expert, this is proved by a
number of facts, specifically, by the publicized talks of a high-ranking
official at the Lithuanian Foreign Ministry and the Lithuanian Ambassador to
Romania, who are saying that they support Armenia's stance in the Karabakh
peace process in the prejudice of Azerbaijan. 
In addition, the Azeri authorities have been harshly refused by
Lithuania's official representative to fix Moldavian Ombudsperson Aurelia
Grigoriu's anti-Armenian statements about "Armenia's occupation of 20% of
Azerbaijan's territory and the genocide in Khojalu" in the final act of
the conference held in Yerevan in early July 2013 under the aegis of the
European Union. Baku lobbied these statements through Moldova's ally Romania,
which has an unlimited impact on Chisinau and has recently been actively
supporting Baku in the Karabakh peace process in exchange for provision of
Azeri energy resources and investments to Romania. However, these initiatives
of Azerbaijan have successfully been neutralized by the lobbying efforts of
Armenia and Armenian communities in Lithuania and other countries of Europe. Given
that since 1 July 2013 Lithuania has been holding the Presidency of the EU and
expressing the joint stance of all the EU member countries, the specified
actions of the Lithuanian officials demonstrate that the European Union's
interest in Azerbaijan is gradually diminishing.

 

The expert believes that the fact that the EU has
offered a special status of trade relations to Nagorno Karabakh within
Armenia's European integration also demonstrates that Brussels is inclined to
support Armenia in the international arena. This exclusive regime fixed in the
Armenia-EU Association Agreement will allow Stepanakert to join the EU common
customs area and deliver its goods to the European market at reduced tariffs. This
will contribute to enhancement of the economic and military strength of Nagorno
Karabakh and its independent status in general. So, the signing of the
Association Agreement between Yerevan and Brussels will be the European Union's
symbolic recognition of the NKR's sovereignty through trade and economic
instruments. One can say confidently that Armenia has smoked the competition
against Azerbaijan for the attention and support of the EU. Simon Manukian
thinks that one of the most important tasks of the Armenian leadership is to
gain Azerbaijani officials' participation in the Eastern Partnership Summit in
Lithuania in November 2013. The presence of at least one representative of the
Azeri authorities during the initialing of the Armenia-EU Association Agreement
in Vilnius will mean Baku's actual consent to the launch of the process of
international recognition of the NKR's sovereignty under the aegis of Eastern
Partnership.  However, these
unambiguously pro-Armenian political steps of the EU make Azerbaijan fly into
Moscow's arms. Russia signed military contracts and agreements on promotion of
cooperation with Baku in the field of mining and transportation of gas and oil
resources to Europe on the threshold of the presidential elections in
Azerbaijan. These agreements give an excellent opportunity to the Russian
authorities to strengthen their influence on Azerbaijan. Moscow has realized at
once that Armenia's European integration is a purely political project and is
unlikely to bring any economic dividends to Yerevan in the near

future. In the meantime, Russia may no more have such
chance to strengthen its positions in Azerbaijan. However, such a situation
will seriously threaten Yerevan. The matter concerns Moscow's creation of an
ad-hoc alliance with Baku and the possible admission of Tbilisi to that
alliance following Georgian Dream's victory during the presidential elections
in Georgia. If Russia starts conflicting with Armenia because of the latter's
European integration, the Moscow-Baku-Tbilisi alliance will not be against the
economic blockade of Yerevan, not to mention Azerbaijan's possible desire to
dispose of Armenia with Russia's "hands"!

 

Manukian thinks that at the moment the EU high-ranking
officials have no clear understanding of the instruments of Armenia's political
reorientation and at the same time prevention of both deterioration of the
relations with Baku and Russia's creation of an alliance with Azerbaijan and
Georgia. The Armenian authorities should take into account these risks when
signing agreements with the EU. Probably, the Armenian authorities will need to
prepare and sign an additional agreement within the frames of the Association
Agreement to spell out the parties' obligations in case of economic and
military conflicts with Russia and the neighboring states, including resumption
of armed hostilities in the Nagorno Karabakh conflict zone. The information
leakage in Armenian expert Sergey Minasyan's recent statements about the
ongoing Armenia-EU private negotiations on Nagorno-Karabakh's status following
the signing of the Association Agreement is probably the evidence of discussion
of the specified additional agreement within the Association Agreement.