ARMENIA HAS BEEN GIVEN A YEAR

Negotiations between the presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia on a settlement to the Karabakh conflict were held at the Hotel de Marigny in Paris at the initiative of French President Francois Hollande.

The French president made this proposal to hold the meeting during his visit to the South Caucasus back in May. However, as the specific timeframe and an agenda were being agreed, the situation worsened on the temporary cease-fire line and as a result of the fighting dozens of troops were killed and wounded on both sides. In order to prevent a further escalation of hostilities, Russian President Vladimir Putin initiated an urgent meeting between the Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents in Sochi. Then, at the NATO summit in Wales, US Secretary of State John Kerry organized another meeting between presidents Ilham Aliyev and Serzh Sargsyan, at which he was present. Given the tension on the front line, the purpose of these meetings was not to advance the negotiations on a peace settlement, but were organized to maintain a continuity of dialogue between the presidents and, most important of all, to prevent the conflict becoming more explosive.

The Paris meeting was preceded by a visit by the co-chairs of the Minsk group to the region. It had been thoroughly prepared and therefore one would have supposed that the sides would depart from an exchange of their recent mutual reproaches and accusations and return to meaningful negotiations. These expectations were confirmed, albeit not in full measure. After a meeting attended by the French president, the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents held thorough talks along with the co-chairs of the Minsk group Igor Popov (Russia), James Warlick (USA), Pierre Andrieu (France) and the personal representative of the OSCE chairman-in-office, Andrzej Kasprzyk.  Serzh Sargsyan and Ilham Aliyev then had a face-to-face meeting. The results of the negotiations were summed up during a joint meeting of the three presidents and the co-chairs of the OSCE's Minsk Group.

Since no basic agreed document had been placed on the negotiating table by the mediators, no specific accords were expected at the Paris meeting. Therefore, only the agreement between the parties to conduct an exchange of information about missing persons during the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict under the aegis of the International Red Cross could be regarded as a local result. One can assume that the parties expressed a willingness to intensify their discussion of the more controversial elements of a peace agreement with the participation of the co-chairs of the Minsk group and make efforts to preserve, at least for the time being, military stability on the dividing line.

Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov expressed Azerbaijan's appraisal of the meeting: "Every meeting at the level of the Azerbaijani and Armenian presidents is generally a positive thing. Such meetings contribute to an understanding of the mood of the opposing sides with the object of making progress towards a settlement of the conflict. At the Paris meeting, in the course of the day the negotiations passed through several stages where questions were examined on which we have not yet succeeded in making progress," the minister said in an interview for APA. He said that President Ilham Aliyev once again expressed Baku's principled position, which is that to achieve a peaceful settlement Armenian armed forces must first be withdrawn from Azerbaijan's occupied territories. "As soon as this requirement, which, incidentally, has been distinctly supported by the co-chairs of the OSCE's Minsk Group and has been recorded in well-known resolutions of the UN Security Council, is fulfilled, broad opportunities will emerge for security in the region, the opening of borders and communications and the coordination of questions on strengthening confidence-building measures, because if there are no Armenian troops on our territory snipers will become irrelevant and there will be a substantial reduction in military incidents," the minister said.

For his part, Armenia's Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandyan described the Paris meeting as: "…useful, honest and constructive", noting that "…a step was made towards bringing the sides closer together and that there has been a positive shift in the moods of the sides from the Sochi to the Paris meetings." He repeated Armenia's well-known position on the need, first and foremost, to implement confidence-building measures and strengthen the cease-fire regime, professing solidarity with this position of the co-chairs of the Minsk group. However, one only has to cast a cursory glance at the text circulated after the meeting to discover the usual lies and distortion of facts typical of Armenian diplomacy and propaganda. 

According to a report posted on the official website of the Elysee Palace, the French president noted the need for an effective reduction of tension in relations between the two sides on the troop contact line. Francois Hollande urged the presidents of the two countries to step up their efforts on the negotiations and a lasting settlement of the Nagornyy Karabakh conflict in line with the principles of international law and the principles defined by the co-chairs of the Minsk group. Francois Hollande also noted the unacceptability of maintaining the status quo in a Karabakh settlement. He urged the presidents of both sides to demonstrate the political will required for overcoming disagreements. In order to get things moving the French president proposed to start drawing up a comprehensive peace agreement. It is Azerbaijan which has many times proposed that work should begin on precisely such a document.

As we have seen, at the Paris meeting the Armenians failed to note either the advisability of signing up to the negotiations process by the representatives of the so-called "NKR" or to win support for their idea of consolidating the "status-quo". On the contrary, French President Hollande declared the unacceptability of such a "status quo" and called for work to begin on a comprehensive peace agreement.

While verbally calling for a peaceful settlement of the conflict the Armenian side, as usual, did everything to poison the atmosphere of the coming Paris meeting. The day before, Serzh Sargsyan gave a provocative interview to the American New York Times in which he made crude attacks, unworthy of a civilised politician, on Azerbaijan and its government. Whereas on the one hand the aim of such behaviour by the Armenian side before each round of talks has been to distract attention from the essence of the peace process, on the other hand Sargsyan's reckless statements are aimed at maintaining at least some kind of political weight of the ruling regime in a situation of growing social unrest and increasing acts of protest in Armenia. One could by no means regard as accidental the staging of the farce on 27 October, the very day of the Paris talks, under the name of a "trial" of Azerbaijani citizens Dilqam Asgarov and Sahbaz Quliyev, who were declared saboteurs and captured in Armenian-occupied Kalbacar District (a third friend, Hasan Hasanov, was killed while under arrest). They were accused of "illegally crossing the border", whereas in fact they were going home to visit the graves of their mothers and fathers in an area which is an integral part of the Azerbaijani Republic. The charge against them of murdering an Armenian boy and an Armenian officer was fabricated and unsubstantiated. The continuation of such actions casts doubt on the sincerity of the Armenian side's intentions of achieving real progress in a peaceful settlement of the inordinately protracted Karabakh conflict.

As has been reported after the Paris meeting, the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents, Serzh Sargsyan and Ilham Aliyev, agreed to continue their dialogue at the next session of the UN General Assembly in September 2015. The Armenian media interprets this as a time-out of one year being declared in a Karabakh settlement. Such a break, they believe, is necessary while relations in the global world become more settled. Thoughts are being expressed that the coming year could be pivotal for the region, bearing in mind the rapprochement that is forming between Iran and the West, the new power landscape in the Middle East and the new nature of relations between the West and Russia.

But there are simpler circumstances that do not lend themselves to global geopolitics. Next spring Yerevan will be preparing to mark the centenary of the so-called "Armenian genocide" on a wide scale, inviting delegations from many countries. They want to make the maximum use of this date to strengthen the international positions of the Armenian community and consolidate Serzh Sargsyan's regime, which has been weakened by the general dissatisfaction at the corruption scandals and economic stagnation. In these circumstances, one cannot count on Armenia presenting an amenable or constructive position at the talks on the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict.

It would also be inexpedient to exert military pressure on the Armenians in an atmosphere of an already artificially exaggerated wave of international sympathy for the "much-suffering people" in the run-up to this date. Besides this, Baku itself is preparing to host the first European Olympic Games in the summer, suggesting the declaration of a truce even where there is a war.

Against this background, the sides will clearly opt for "quiet diplomacy" and negotiations at the level of experts, foreign ministers and the co-chairs of the Minsk group. It is important that time should not be wasted so that by the time a dialogue is resumed at presidential level documents can be prepared which can become an integral part of a comprehensive peace agreement on a settlement to the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict over Nagornyy Karabakh. In other words, next year should be regarded as an opportunity for the Armenian side to return to a constructive course.

By the autumn of 2015 Azerbaijan will in many ways have completed the programme of a substantial strengthening of the army, which it is now implementing. The illusory nature of the hopes of the Armenians for any kind of preferences or compensation in connection with the centenary of the so-called "1915 genocide" will be confirmed, and the rejection by the international community of aggressive separatism and forced seizure of the territory of other states will only intensify in the context of the events in Crimea and the Ukrainian Donbass. Armenia's economic and demographic problems are here to stay. Any time-out has to come to an end sometime and it is important what the sides come up with before it becomes impossible to put off the taking of fateful decisions any longer.