SIGNALS FROM DUSHANBE SUMMIT

The Dushanbe summit of the Collective Security Treaty Orga-nization (CSTO) has become quite a remarkable event in Eurasian geopolitics. First, in terms of outlining the organizational appearance and essential content of this structure; second, in the context of the dramatic processes going on in the Middle East and all along the perimeter of the CSTO, as well as related regional- and global-scale threats. 

Combat Against Terrorism as Priority

To all appearances, the leaders of Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Armenia are seriously concerned about CSTO prospects and practicable forms of further cooperation within this structure which is the only military political association throughout the post-Soviet space. In purely organizational terms, this manifested itself in Russian President Vladimir Putin's initiative to reshuffle the political leadership of the bloc. Namely, to put on a rotary basis the post of CSTO secretary general, which has been held by Nikolay Bordyuzha for 12 years now. However no specific decision on this issue will be approved at the top level until the expiry of Bordyuzha's term in office at the end of this year. 

As regards the essence of the CSTO's activity, a joint statement of the heads of state has been adopted. On the one hand, the statement reflects their concerns over new growing threats and, on the other hand, it lays down their readiness to jointly counter those challenges. The threats in question are related first and foremost to the growing terrorist threat coming both from the Afghan sector and the Middle East where the so-called Islamic State (IS) is carrying on its offensive. Presidents Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan and Almazbek Atambayev of Kyrgyzstan noted the growing popularity of IS even in the territory of Afghanistan which has so far been regarded as a happy hunting ground for Taliban. 

The CSTO member states have agreed to coordinate their efforts in combat against extremism and other threats to security through its Crisis Response Centre to be set up in Moscow and to function actually under the aegis of the Russian National Centre for Defence Control. However, it is not this detail that produced the greatest impact but Russian President Vladimir Putin's call for the allied countries and the entire global community to rally against IS. The Russian president views support to President Bashar al-Asad as a realistic tool for achieving the set goal to defeat the terrorist offensive in the Middle East. Proceeding from this, Putin urged the Western centres opposed to official Damascus to "forget about geopolitical interests". 

In the Russian president's opinion, a broad front for combat against IS, which currently controls vast territories in Iraq and Syria and has "its sights set on Mecca, Jerusalem and cities of Europe, Russia, Central and South East Asia", may include the Syrian government's troops, moderate Syrian opposition and Kurdish militia. Putin has confirmed that Russia supports and will further provide the necessary military aid to the Syrian government. 

Thus Moscow has again pointed out that the Syria crisis cannot be solved and IS cannot be defeated without active involvement of official Damascus. The initiative for the international community to cooperate with the al-Asad government in combat against terrorism was voiced by Putin at quite a difficult moment for Europe which is actually faced with mass migration of residents from the war-ridden East to countries of the Old World. Will the European Union and the USA, which have made up an international coalition against IS, accept the Russian leader's proposal to rely in their combat against terrorism on the Syrian president who has long since been "outlawed" by the West? It is highly unlikely to happen. It is the West that kindled armed conflicts in quite a number of countries of the Muslim world over the past few years and carried out military operations, in particular, against Iraq and Libya. It is the policy of the West that created every condition for a terrorist invasion of Syria. Therefore there are no grounds to suppose that the USA and the EU will back Putin's call, let alone approve of the hypothetical opportunity for Moscow to set up a pro-Asad and anti-IS coalition comprising CSTO member states. 

Nevertheless, the heads of the CSTO member states expressed their concern at the summit in Dushanbe about the growing activity of Islamic State, and this shows that the post-Soviet military-political bloc views just this particular problem as the main threat to their interests at the moment. It is noteworthy that, against the backdrop of the IS menace, the final statement of the summit did not mention the Ukraine crisis which has fixed the attention not only of Russia but also of other countries across the former Soviet space. Meanwhile, one of the CSTO member states is utterly concerned not so much about the ups and downs of the combat against international terrorism, as about prospects for its own aggressive policy which is radically opposed to international law and principles underlying civilized coexistence of countries and peoples. We are speaking about Armenia continuing its occupation of Azerbaijan's territories and hoping for its CSTO membership to protect it if Azerbaijan starts a war of liberation. 

Armenia's Strategic Failure

During his meeting with Vladimir Putin who had called him to arrive in Moscow a few days before the CSTO summit in Dushanbe, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan complained about Azerbaijan's military power. On that occasion, Sargsyan informed his Russian counterpart on his intention to raise this issue at the CSTO summit. In fact he did as much during the discussion in Dushanbe, saying that, allegedly, "attempts by the Azerbaijani side to exacerbate the situation in the absence of an adequate reaction from the international community are fraught with destabilization of the situation throughout the region". 

However, the summit participants' reaction to Sargsyan's statement demonstrated that the Armenian president's lamentations about "Azerbaijani threat" are of little interest not only to Putin who had shown no reaction to them during their rendezvous in Moscow, but also to the leaders of Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. In this context, it is reasonable to ask the question: did Sargsyan really suppose that the heads of the CSTO states had no idea of what country had occupied Azerbaijani territories and banished a million-strong Azeri population from those lands making the people live as displaced persons for more than 20 years now? 

In any event, the Armenian expert community can only feel annoyed at the fact that the Karabakh issue is just non-existent for the CSTO and, despite all efforts by Sargsyan, the final statement of the Dushanbe summit made no mention whatever of these problems. Armenian media openly admit that Yerevan has failed to accomplish its strategic task and to "sober up" the CSTO in which a majority of members not only have no common interests with Armenia but are strategic allies of Azerbaijan. 

In 2016, Armenia is going to preside at the CSTO and we can have no doubt that it will try to use the platform of this organization to provide even the least support to its occupation of Azerbaijani lands. However we can suppose even now that Yerevan's attempts will be doomed to fail. First, because other CSTO member states that are well-informed about the true causes underlying the Karabakh conflict and have no reasons to speak against the rightful position of Azerbaijan. Second, priorities in the CSTO activity are now focused on efforts to counter international terrorism. When setting such goals, it is absurd to waste the organization's internal resources and energy on conniving at the whims of its weakest link - Armenia.