Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan will not attend the meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the CIS to be held in Bishkek on October 13. Nikol Pashinyan has said in a telephone conversation with the President of Kyrgyzstan Sadyr Japarov.

According to the press service of the President of Kyrgyzstan, the telephone conversation between Japarov and Pashinyan took place at the initiative of the Armenian side.

“Current issues of the bilateral agenda were discussed, including the upcoming meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the Commonwealth of Independent States, which will be held in Bishkek on October 13 of this year.

During the conversation, the prime minister of Armenia announced with regret that due to a number of circumstances he would not be able to take part in the meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the CIS.

The leaders agreed to maintain constant contacts and strengthen bilateral relations in the spirit of friendship for the benefit of the peoples of the two countries.”

By Harut Sassounian,

On Nov. 10, 2020, Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, President of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev, and President of Russia Vladimir Putin signed a ceasefire agreement in the Artsakh War.

Ceasefires usually signify that the warring sides stop the fighting wherever they had reached until then. Oddly, in the case of the 2020 ceasefire agreement, Armenia surrendered to Azerbaijan large swaths of land where no Azeri soldier had set foot on, such as the Agdam, Kalbajar and Lachin districts, but not the Corridor.

Therefore, the 2020 agreement was more of a capitulation than a ceasefire for Armenia. Here are the resulting problems:

1) Prime Minister Pashinyan had no reason to sign a ceasefire agreement with Azerbaijan since the war was between Azerbaijan and Artsakh, not Armenia. Neither Armenia nor Azerbaijan had declared war against each other.

2) Pashinyan had no authorization to turn over to Azerbaijan territories that belonged to Artsakh, not Armenia.

3) The 2020 agreement set deadlines for Armenia, but not for Azerbaijan, to carry out various obligations, such as the evacuation of territories and exchange of prisoners of war. Unwisely, the Armenian government handed over all the Azeri prisoners right away, while Azerbaijan released only a small number of Armenian prisoners. Three years later, dozens of Armenian prisoners are still languishing in Baku jails. Pashinyan is not only making no efforts to return these prisoners but does not even talk about them.

4) Under the 2020 agreement, the Lachin Corridor — the only road that connected Artsakh to Armenia — was forcefully and illegally taken over by Azerbaijan on Dec. 12, 2022, even though Russian Peacekeepers were supposed to control it.

5) The 2020 agreement mandated that “all economic and transport connections in the region shall be unblocked.” This means that both Armenia and Azerbaijan would be able to cross each other’s territories. Pashinyan expressed his readiness to allow Azeris to travel through Armenia from the eastern part of Azerbaijan to its exclave of Nakhichevan, but never mentioned that such access was to be reciprocal. Contrary to the 2020 agreement, Azerbaijan demanded not just a passage, but a ‘corridor’ which means that the road through Armenia would belong to Azerbaijan. Pres. Aliyev never once mentioned that he will in turn allow Armenians to cross Azerbaijan’s border. To make matters worse, Turkey has been falsely demanding that Armenia accept the ‘Zangezur Corridor’ before it would agree to open the Armenia-Turkey border.

6) Pashinyan has repeatedly talked about his plan to sign a peace treaty with Azerbaijan. There is no need to sign such a peace treaty since Armenia was not at war with Azerbaijan. Peace treaties are signed between warring parties. Azerbaijan was at war with Artsakh, not Armenia.

7) Contrary to the 2020 agreement, which mandated that Russian Peacekeepers would remain in Artsakh until 2025, Azerbaijan violated that provision by invading and occupying the remainder of Artsakh last month, forcing its 120,000 inhabitants to flee to Armenia.

8) Azerbaijan’s occupation of Artsakh in September 2023 made the role of the Russian Peacekeepers unnecessary, which means that the Russian soldiers would have to leave what is now Azeri territory.

9) While there are good reasons to blame Russia for its inaction in protecting Artsakh Armenians, there is an equally good reason to blame Pashinyan for conceding that Artsakh is part of Azerbaijan. It is clear that despite Russia’s alliance with Armenia, given its involvement in the Ukraine War, Pres. Putin has decided that Turkey (the only NATO member that has not sanctioned Russia) and its junior brother Azerbaijan are much more important to Russia’s national interests than Armenia or Artsakh. Meanwhile, the West has not been of much help to Armenia either, except for issuing supportive statements, but no action.

10) After the 2020 War, when Azerbaijan’s army entered and occupied the eastern territory of Armenia, Pashinyan not only makes no effort to dislodge the enemy from Armenia’s sovereign territory but does not even talk about Azerbaijan’s illegal presence there.

11) Pashinyan’s long list of mistakes includes acknowledging that the Soviet-era Azeri inhabited enclaves inside Armenia are part of Azerbaijan. There was no reason for Pashinyan to offer to Azerbaijan these enclaves, especially since Aliyev had made no such demands.

12) Pashinyan unilaterally recognized Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity without any reciprocal recognition by Aliyev.

Given Pashinyan’s mishandling of the above 12 critical issues, refusal to resign and turn over his seat to a competent leader, the only option left for him is to declare that the 2020 agreement is null and void since Azerbaijan has violated most of its provisions.

Pashinyan should refuse to sit at the negotiating table with Aliyev until he releases all Armenian prisoners of war and withdraws his troops from Armenia’s territory. Aliyev should first honor his previous commitments before Armenians can trust him to abide by future agreements.

Fortunately, the 2020 agreement can easily be discarded because it was not ratified by the Parliaments of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Russia as an international treaty. It was simply signed by Pashinyan without consulting anyone. The next leader of Armenia, on his first day in office, should nullify the 2020 agreement.

Should Russia cut off the gas, let it cut it off, our people will live without gas. Gagik Melkonyan

Why does Russia scare us? should he cut off the gas, let him cut it off, our people will live without gas.

In a conversation with Tert.am, Gurgen (Gagik) Melkonyan, a member of the National Assembly’s Standing Committee on Defense and Security Affairs, expressed such a point of view.

“If they have to cut the gas, let them cut it, we don’t want that gas either, our people will live without gas. We have overcome so many difficulties. What do they want? Are they going to close the wire, let them close it,” said the government deputy, stressing that Russia is no longer Armenia’s strategic ally.

Details in the video.

“How Turkish Agent Pashian’s Betrayal Led to Artsakh Leadership Arrest

Throughout the 1980s, the Republic of Armenia consistently stood by the side of the people of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), offering encouragement, assistance, and unwavering support in their pursuit of self-determination. However, everything changed on September 19, 2023.

This abrupt shift in Armenia’s stance has left Armenians worldwide deeply disillusioned, disheartened, and profoundly troubled by the fate that has befallen the indigenous people of Artsakh. After centuries of enduring the loss of their ancestral lands at the hands of invaders, Armenians had finally reclaimed a portion of their historical territory.

The consequences of this betrayal are profound, leading to shock, grief, preoccupation with despair, damaged self-esteem, self-doubt, and seething anger. In many cases, these emotions bring about life-altering transformations.”

WASHINGTON – Today, U.S. Senator Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, issued the following statement on the need to support Armenia and reevaluate military assistance and security cooperation with Azerbaijan.

“Following nearly a year of a horrific blockade, President Aliyev finally used military power to exert control over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh, effectively erasing its Armenian population and rich history. As the world continues to grapple with Azerbaijan’s coordinated, intentional campaign of ethnic cleansing, we must both prioritize support for the Armenians who have been expelled as well as hold Azerbaijan accountable.

“As we look forward we must take steps to ensure that Azerbaijan does not advance militarily in pursuit for further territorial gains, including forcefully condemning inflammatory rhetoric. The United States should halt security assistance to Azerbaijan until it has stopped this brutal campaign. The United States and the international community must also reaffirm our commitment to documenting war crimes and atrocities, as well as continue to support efforts to repatriate prisoners of war, many of whom Azerbaijan continues to detain.

“Finally, we must stand in solidarity with the Armenian people, particularly as Azerbaijan and Turkey eye the potential Zangezur corridor. We should increase humanitarian support for those ethnic Armenians who have left Nagorno-Karabakh. The U.S. should also continue to support democratic reforms that Armenia’s leadership has taken in recent years, including efforts to promote transparency, good governance, and economic cooperation with the United States and Western Europe more broadly.”

Members of the European Parliament (EP) plan to adopt a resolution calling on EU countries to impose sanctions against Azerbaijan due to the events in Nagorno-Karabakh. The resolution also proposes suspending the development of cooperation and reducing dependence on Azerbaijani gas imports.

While European Parliament resolutions on foreign policy issues are not legally binding, they carry political weight, and other European institutions typically take them into consideration.

The draft resolution ‘on the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh after Azerbaijan’s attack and the continuing threats against Armenia’ states, “The European Parliament calls for the EU and its Member States to adopt targeted sanctions against individuals in the Azerbaijani Government responsible for multiple ceasefire violations and violations of human rights in Nagorno-Karabakh.”

Furthermore, MEPs intend to call on the EU High Representative for Foreign Policy to suspend negotiations on updating the partnership agreement with Azerbaijan until the country demonstrates a genuine willingness to respect the rights and security of the Armenian population in Nagorno-Karabakh.

“The European Parliament calls for a comprehensive review of the EU’s relations with Azerbaijan, taking into account recent developments and the worsening human rights situation in the country; calls, if Azerbaijan continues to disregard its commitments, for the EU and its Member States to consider suspending the visa facilitation agreement with Azerbaijan and lowering the level of cooperation with the country in other areas,” the draft says.

By Harut Sassounian

There are many justified complaints about Russia’s shameful role in the loss of Artsakh and inaction in coming to the defense of Armenia’s borders. However, there is also a lot to complain about regarding the indifference of the international community, including the United States, to Azerbaijan’s aggression against Artsakh and Armenia.

For 30 years, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Minsk Group, composed of the United States, France, and Russia, the mediators in the Artsakh conflict, issued repeated statements about the unacceptability of the use of force, urging the settlement of the dispute through peaceful negotiations.

However, contrary to such well-intentioned words, when Azerbaijan repeatedly attacked Artsakh and Armenia with frequent shootings at the border for three decades, the OSCE Minsk Group simply issued meaningless statements, urging both sides not to engage in violence. The OSCE, however, never bothered to point a finger at the guilty party — Azerbaijan — thus equating the victimizer with the victim.

Such unjust statements encouraged Azerbaijan to brazenly continue its attacks, culminating in the unleashing of a massive war against Artsakh in 2020, followed by incursions into the territory of Armenia. Last month, Azerbaijan violated the agreement it signed in 2020 to allow Russian peacekeepers to protect the remnants of Artsakh’s population until 2025. Pres. Ilham Aliyev, knowing full well that no foreign country would intervene to stop his attacks, ethnically cleansed the 120,000 inhabitants of Artsakh and drove them out of their historical homeland.

On Sept. 14, 2023, the Acting Assistant Secretary of State Yuri Kim testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee: “We will not tolerate any military action. We will not tolerate any attack on the people of Nagorno-Karabakh.” Days later, Azerbaijan attacked and occupied Artsakh confident that the U.S. government was bluffing.

Naturally, no one expected the United States or another major power to send troops to defend Artsakh and Armenia, but merely urging Azerbaijan not to block the Lachin Corridor or refrain from the use of force is an exercise in futility. The international community did not even impose sanctions on Azerbaijan because its gas and oil were more valuable than Armenian blood.

To make matters worse, after ignoring Azerbaijan’s repeated attacks on Artsakh and Armenia since the 2020 war, Samantha Power, the Administrator of U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), finally arrived in Armenia last week, bringing along a letter from Pres. Joe Biden which contained a lot of sweet words for Armenians, but once again, no action.

Even more shocking, Power offered the pitiful amount of $11.5 million in humanitarian aid to the 120,000 destitute Artsakh refugees. That’s almost $96 for each refugee, deprived of housing, food, medicines and other basic necessities. This is a shameful amount of money compared to the USAID’s annual budget of $50 billion. Her visit was too late and accomplished too little.

Several other countries and international agencies also pledged assistance to the Artsakh Armenians: France ($7.4 million), Germany ($5.3 million), the European Union ($5.3 million), Sweden ($1.3 million), Canada ($1.85 million), Denmark ($140,000), United Nations Refugee Agency, UNHCR (amount unspecified), Japan (amount unspecified), Spain (amount unspecified). Armenia committed $25 million, plus $125 for rent and utilities per month for six months for each refugee. The government of Cyprus invited the Artsakh refugees to resettle in Cyprus. However, it is not a good idea to take these displaced Armenians out of Armenia.

In addition, dozens of Armenian organizations throughout the Diaspora are raising funds to help the Artsakh refugees. There are also many charitable organizations and businesses in Armenia that are helping the Artsakh Armenians with funds, supplies or services. Armenia’s Ministry of Finance opened a bank account to receive donations from the public. There is also an office set up by the Armenian government to coordinate the distribution of the offered assistance.

Just in case someone thinks that the pledged assistance is a lot of money, it is in fact a negligible amount compared to the vast needs of the refugees for the months and years to come. Ukraine, on the other hand, has received so far $80 billion from the United States for its military, financial and humanitarian needs. In addition, 41 other countries have contributed tens of billions of dollars to Ukraine.

The lack of concrete action by the Biden Administration, aside from pledging $11.5 million to the Artsakh refugees, has highly disappointed many Armenian-Americans. It is surprising that Pres. Biden, an experienced politician and candidate for reelection next year, who has one of the lowest ratings in the history of the United States for an incumbent president, has not made more of an effort to win over Armenian-American voters. Even if Pres. Biden does not care about Armenia and Artsakh, he should have at least cared about his own self-interest, which is getting votes for his own re-election.

it’s high time to contemplate the situation. Pashinyan, in order to maintain his position, borrowed a significant $5 billion, which was injected into law enforcement and the bureaucracy. Now, the consequences are starting to surface, and it’s time for the nation to bear the cost. The Armenian dram has experienced a rapid depreciation against major foreign currencies, plummeting by 50 drams in less than a week. Previously, the exchange rate stood at $1=385, but currently, it has weakened to $1=435.

BEFORE: $1=385
NOW: $1=435

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Azerbaijan’s takeover of the Nagorno-Karabakh region by military force on September 19, triggering an exodus of Armenians from the disputed region, is a major setback for European Union and United States diplomacy.

The victory by force has enormous regional and international implications. It will incite a new spiral of hate between Armenians and Azerbaijanis and erode peacemaking efforts in the region. What is more, it creates a dangerous precedent of authoritarian “conflict resolution,” undermining the credibility of liberal democracies in settling disputes peacefully. Despite its relative weakness, Russia is setting the (authoritarian) norms in this conflict, not the EU or the US.

The most recent dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh goes back more than 30 years to the fall of the Soviet Union. After Armenia won the first war in 1994, Azerbaijan in 2020 regained seven surrounding regions and parts of Nagorno-Karabakh, but not the region itself – until now. In just one day, on September 19, Azerbaijan took control over the self-proclaimed republic with its large Armenian population of nearly 120,000 people. Under international law as regards the territorial integrity of states, Nagorno-Karabakh is part of Azerbaijan. Therefore, it is not a question of whether Azerbaijan should control its territory, but how it regains this control, peacefully or by force. Despite ongoing internationally facilitated negotiations and compromises from the Armenian government, leaders in the Azerbaijan capital Baku have systematically planned the military takeover since the second Karabakh War in autumn of 2020, when

Azerbaijan had to accept a ceasefire agreement negotiated by Russia. 

Azerbaijan’s military dominance, built with Israeli military technology and comprehensive support from NATO member Turkey, helped it easily take the region, putting Russian “peace forces” deployed in Nagorno-Karabakh to the test. But one thing is clear – without Russia’s blessing, this military operation would not have been possible. It reflects the new geopolitical reality in the region since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, where different powers are competing for their interests and a new regional security order is being negotiated. Although Russia seems to have lost influence, it will remain a key actor in the region, making the rules in bargaining with Azerbaijan, Turkey, and Iran. Human rights and peaceful conflict resolution are not in the mindset of this authoritarian norm-setting. 

A Change in Interests since Russia’s War Against Ukraine 

Russia’s war against Ukraine has shifted its interests in the South Caucasus, increasing its demand for a North-South route to Iran via Azerbaijan and for more transit routes to Turkey. These alternative connections for trade and transit should also help circumvent Western sanctions. Furthermore, as a close ally of Baku, Turkey is a key partner in this endeavor. Contrary to its projected image, Russia has never been an altruistic protective power for Armenia. It has kept the balance between Armenia and Azerbaijan in recent decades by supplying both sides with weapons and has tried to keep the West out of the region. Now it needs all the weapons it can get for its war against Ukraine.

Russia has deployed nearly 2000 not internationally recognized peace forces to Nagorno-Karabakh since the 2020 ceasefire agreement. It also agreed to guarantee the land route to Armenia via the Lachin corridor. But Russia is no longer willing or able to fulfill those guarantees. Indeed, the authoritarian regime in Baku is much closer in terms of governance to the Kremlin than the government of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. Pashinyan was democratically elected twice, first in 2018 after the Armenian “velvet revolution” and again in 2021 after the second Nagorno-Karabakh war. He has come under fire from the Russian leadership for distancing his country from Moscow, which increasingly tries to undermine his legitimacy with personal attacks and disinformation campaigns. He has even started to question Armenia’s 

participation in the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organization. 

The Russian-brokered ceasefire agreement in 2020 circumvented the multilateral OSCE Minsk group as the main negotiation format, and Russia has since tried to regionalize the conflict in a trilateral format which it controls. Turkey also wanted to join this format but was only allowed to join a joint monitoring center on Nagorno Karabakh with Russia. In reaction, the EU and the US have created their own complementary facilitation formats to internationalize the conflict and create an alternative to the Russian deal-making approach. But they failed to achieve a breakthrough, since neither the EU nor the US was able or willing to exert pressure on both conflicting parties – particularly on Baku – for a functioning mechanism to implement an agreement On the part of the EU, the lack of support from larger member states weakened the negotiating power of the European Council President Charles Michel. One exception was French President Emmanuel Macron, but he is seen as biased due to France’s large Armenian minority, and he has not been consistent in his approach. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz took part in a June 1 meeting of Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders at the European Political Community (EPC) Summit in Chisinau, Moldova, but this had no effect on resolving the conflict and merely laid bare Germany’s halfhearted engagement in the region as we can also see in Georgia.

The Next Stage of Escalation is Coming

Azerbaijan’s takeover of Nagorno-Karabakh in no way ended or deescalated the conflict but instead is likely to usher in a new stage of humiliation and revenge. In addition to the humanitarian catastrophe taking place in that region, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev now wants to undermine the territorial integrity of the Armenian state. Both countries still have not agreed on the delimitation of their borders since the fall of the Soviet Union, and Azerbaijan last year took small but strategically important parts of Armenian border regions. Baku’s next aim is to carve out an extraterritorial corridor to its exclave Nakhichevan via the Southern Syunik region of Armenia, and it threatens to do so by force if Armenia does not comply. A meeting between Ilham Aliyev and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Nakhichevan on September 25 demonstrated Turkish support for this idea. Russia also has an interest in this additional route to Turkey, and the 2020 ceasefire agreement includes a clause that border forces of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) will guarantee its safety. Since Yerevan trusts neither Moscow nor Baku, Armenia sees this as an additional threat.

Furthermore, President Aliyev has initiated a discussion about a constructed “Western Azerbaijan” that questions the very existence of the Armenian state. This aggressive rhetoric combined with a language of hate, the military dominance of Azerbaijan, and limited action by the international community to deter this policy of force has invited Baku to maximize its demands. The weak reaction from the EU and US to the second Nagorno-Karabakh war, and now the military takeover of the disputed region, have encouraged the Azerbaijani government. EU member states were not even able to agree on a common statement condemning Baku’s military aggression with hundreds of victims because Hungary refused to support it.

According to international law, Azerbaijan has the right to regain control of its territory. But systematically starving the people of Nagorno-Karabakh over months, killing civilians, bombing civil infrastructure and driving people out by threat and force contravenes international law and human rights. Rather than liberal peacemaking, this authoritarian “conflict settlement” by force has become the successful model for the time being. It is not the EU and the US who are defining the rules of the game with negotiated compromise, mediation, and trust-building through people-to-people contacts, but Baku with military power and the support of Russia and Turkey.

Russia as a Norm-Setter 

Despite public debate about Russia losing influence in the South Caucasus due to its military overstretch in Ukraine, the opposite is true. Russia is the successful norm-setter in this conflict with use of force, power of strength, and zero-sum logic. Moscow is making deals with Azerbaijan at the cost of the Karabakh Armenians and the sovereignty of the Armenian state. Yes, Armenian elites missed their chance for a peace agreement under better conditions years ago when Armenia still controlled Nagorno-Karabakh and the seven surrounding regions. But the West has failed to react adequately to Azerbaijan’s 2020 war and did not deter Baku from further aggression. Now, once again, its subdued 

reaction to this one-day war and failure to deter more military violence could encourage Baku to take the “Zangezur corridor” to Nakhichevan or the entire Syunik region. The lack of action and clear messaging by the West was a precondition for Putin’s war against Ukraine. A repeat of this mistake is an invitation for President Aliyev, with the support of Turkish President Erdogan, to further undermine the territorial integrity of the Armenian state and take revenge on Armenia for the first Nagorno-Karabakh war. 

The West must be unequivocal: Any aggression against Armenia will come with high costs and a tough response. This should be clearly communicated to President Aliyev with both offers of support and the threat of sanctions. If Azerbaijan agrees on a sustainable peace and border agreement with Armenia, the EU could offer more investment in transit corridors and in rebuilding the liberated territories. If there is more aggression, the EU should sanction the purchase of Azerbaijani gas, which comprises for around 3 percent of EU gas imports. The reliance on Azerbaijani gas is overrated and seems to be rather an excuse for non-action than reality. Furthermore, it should sanction those stakeholders who are responsible for violence. This could be via personal sanctions like freezing assets and bank accounts, or travel bans up to the highest level of the Azerbaijani state – closely coordinated with the US. The EU should make a robust offer of sending observers or a peacekeeping mission to ensure the security of the Armenian state. The recent decision to increase personnel for the EU Monitoring Mission in Armenia is a positive step, but not sufficient.

In the framework of the next EPC summit in Granada on October 5, Germany and France should better coordinate their approach and increase their engagement to deescalate, resolve the conflict and agree on possible sanctions. This should be followed by greater ownership and leadership in the conflict by a coalition of EU member states. If the EU fails to set liberal norms for peacemaking in post-Soviet conflict zones, meditated by impartial multilateral actors, it will not only fail as an actor in its own neighborhood but also beyond. 

Russia’s war of aggression in Ukraine should be a wake-up call for the EU to become a security and peace actor in its different neighborhoods and build a robust toolbox with negotiation platforms, sanction regimes, peacekeeping, and monitoring missions. The second Nagorno-Karabakh

Read more: https://dgap.org/de/forschung/publikationen/nagorno-karabakh-rise-authoritarian-conflict-resolution