ACCEPTABLE THRESHOLD

September 27 is the Day of Remembrance to honour the memory of the fallen in the 2020 Great Patriotic War. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and First Lady Mehriban Aliyeva opened on that day a monument to the first fallen soldiers and officers of the 44-day war in the Fuzuli district, the location where the Azerbaijani army broke through the Armenian defence line and began its victorious offensive.

That war changed a lot in the region, if not everything, including the balance of power in the negotiation process. The OSCE Minsk Group proposals lost relevance and went into oblivion, with Baku considering the history of the Minsk Group complete. The issue of the status of Garabagh is not on the agenda any more. Azerbaijan offers Armenia a new peace initiative.

And Ilham Aliyev's recent trip to Lachin was an important turning point in the current situation.

Lachin: Azerbaijan offers peace, but...

President Aliyev’s visit to Lachin coincided with several political vectors. Despite the desperate resistance of the Armenian hawks, Azerbaijan succeeded in relocating the Lachin corridor and regaining control over both the city of Lachin and the villages of Zabukh and Sus. Even Armenia's policy of illegal settlement on these lands and its desire to keep them under its control could not prevent this. The return of Lachin sends an eloquent signal: Azerbaijan is ready and able to push through the implementation of the post-conflict settlement roadmap set out in the November 2020 Trilateral Statement.

In the current situation, these realities take on a different connotation: border delimitation and demarcation becomes almost the key issue of the post-conflict settlement.

"We offered them peace right after the war. This is also perhaps a unique case in military history, for despite the 30-year occupation of our lands, the suffering of our citizens, the destruction of historical and religious monuments and cities, and the placement of over a million mines, we offered peace. But once again we saw that Armenia does not want peace, it is again living with revanchist ideas. We offered to start the delimitation process. They delayed it for more than a year. Today even with the start of this process, it will be a purely formal one, with no substantive negotiations, no discussions on the maps,” President Aliyev said during his visit to Lachin. He openly and rightfully accused Armenia of derailing the border delimitation process.

Experts remind that it was Yerevan that disrupted the delimitation of borders under Russian moderation offered on the basis of the maps of the USSR General Staff right after the end of the war. Moreover, Armenia has not abandoned attempts to stall the border delimitation process with armed provocations, the last one taking place near Lake Garagöl, near the Boyuk Ishigli volcano was in September.

In fact, Yerevan has reasons to be wary of border demarcation. First, illegally annexed territories would have to be returned to Azerbaijan. Secondly, border demarcation is an important step towards their recognition. And this means giving up claims on Garabagh. Pashinyan can exclaim as much as he likes from the UN podium whether Azerbaijan is ready to recognise Armenia's territorial integrity (while claiming its territory to be considerably larger than what it actually is), and yet take no real steps at all.

Yerevan’s another tactic is the change of intermediaries. Initially, the negotiations were moderated by Moscow. Then, at Yerevan's initiative, the EU joined the negotiation process. However, Brussels did not meet Armenia's expectations and today Armenia is actively flirting with Washington.

The US comeback?

The US is clearly keen to get involved, or rather to get back into the post-conflict settlement process. Until the autumn of 2020, Washington could well consider itself a leading player by delegating one of the co-chairs to the OSCE Minsk Group (MG). As the US co-chair Richard Holland acknowledged, diplomats appointed to the MG were either waiting for a full ambassadorial position or simply had to serve until retirement. It would be a stretch to call the OSCE MG effective anyway. The US State Department was confident that it had a good diplomatic springboard for activism in Garabagh, but could well postpone the issue. And they did not expect that the 44-day war would completely change the situation and reshape the previous mediation hierarchy. Moreover, that same fall of 2020, Joe Biden, then still a presidential candidate, harshly criticised Donald Trump for losing the initiative in Garabagh and allowing Russia to dominate. After that, the US could not help but try to get back into the process.

And it seems Yerevan enjoys Washington’s intense desire to get involved. Convinced that both Russian and European mediation are based on proposals and initiatives that Armenia does not want to implement at all, Yerevan now relies on Washington. They believe that Washington's intention to return to the region as a co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group will bring the Minsk Group proposal packages back to the negotiating table. Moreover, the proposals include the discussion of Garabagh's status and prevent Azerbaijan from deploying its army on the liberated territories, only the police and border guards, etc. Whether these expectations are justified is a rhetorical question, but Yerevan is ready to use any opportunity.

Yerevan seems to be seriously concerned about the troubles Russia is experiencing in the international arena amid the Ukrainian war. And by staging another demonstration of resentment against Moscow, Yerevan is flirting with the West. Rather with the US and France, as flirting with the EU failed. Nikol Pashinyan is openly criticising Russian peacekeepers and even allows himself to ignore the visit of CSTO Secretary General Stanislav Zasya to Armenia. This political game between Armenia and the US deserves attention. Especially amid the visit of the US House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi to Armenia.

What brings Pelosi to Yerevan

The 82-year-old Mrs Pelosi has been cooperating with the Armenian lobby for decades. Most experts believe that Pelosi's visit to Armenia, like that of earlier French politicians Zemmour and Pekress, is supposed to attract the votes of local Armenians during the mid-term elections to the US Congress in November. The Democrats have little chance of retaining a majority, and Pelosi may well have to say goodbye to the Speaker's post. So she desperately needs the support of lobbyists.

Remarkably, Nancy Pelosi, who shed few tears at the memorial for the victims of the so-called Armenian genocide and uttered few sentimental yet flattering statements there, refrained from making specific promises of support. She hinted that the decision should be made by Armenia itself. In other words, it was quite clear: while Armenia is a member of the CSTO and the EEU, one should not expect the US to provide particularly generous support. Moreover, as the Armenian experts admit, albeit unwillingly, Pelosi supported the Brussels mediation, which is clearly not in line with the Armenian Dream scenario.

Experts warned that the visit of Pelosi, who declared that ‘Russia must suffer [for the Ukrainian war], would clearly not please Moscow, which, in fact, provides Armenia with unprecedented support and has a right to expect loyalty and predictability from its outpost.

Some in Washington may well be tempted to mistakenly consider Yerevan’s moves as imminent political reorientation. In reality, however, Yerevan has neither the potential, nor the determination, nor the resources to do so. Armenia is not ready to defend its borders on its own, to ensure security without a Russian military base, to maintain railways and cellular communications at its own expense, and finally to pay a real price for oil, gas, diamonds and weapons.

But can this stop Nikol Pashinian from continuing his manoeuvres? From New York he travelled to Paris to hold talks with the French president, while his closest associate, Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan, held talks in Washington, DC.

The question is how quickly this activity will be curtailed after a shout from Moscow.