Introduction
The Third
War over Nagorno-Karabakh, the long-disputed Armenian Enclave within
Azerbaijan, ended almost as soon as it began. The Azerbaijani ‘anti -terror
operations’ began on the afternoon of 19 September 2023 with artillery and
drones and within twenty-four hours the Karabakh Armenians, a population that
has been pushed to the brink of starvation by a months-long economic blockade,
capitulated, leaving Azerbaijan in effective control of the territory.
In
scenes reminiscent of the Balkans in the 1990s, images of convoys of cars
filling the mountain road from Karabakh to Armenia carrying thousands of ethnic
Armenians, leaving their homeland with as much as they can carry, are flooding the
cyberspace. A region that has witnessed many such upheavals over the years
faces yet another round of de facto ethnic cleansing.
While
the focus of the West continues to remain on Ukraine, there is a bigger,
long-term failure here, in their inability to prevent the violence and get the Armenians
and Azerbaijanis to agree to an equitable resolution to this bitterly contested
conflict.
The
Azerbaijani’s have called for the dissolution of all political structures in
the territory, the local Presidency, Parliament, and elected Mayor, and is not
offering the kind of political autonomy. In contrast, President Ilham Aliyev of
Azerbaijan has told the Karabakh Armenians that an earlier offer of status had
“gone to hell” and what was left on the table were as yet undefined
“educational rights, cultural rights, religious rights, and municipal electoral
rights”.
Under
those terms, some older people might choose to stay in Nagorno-Karabakh, and
thousands of Azerbaijanis who lived there up until 1991 might return. But
little or nothing will remain of all the local institutions built there over
three decades.
Although the Enclave had in theory been under the protection of Russian peacekeepers, Russian guarantees ended up being worthless. Russia has instead brokered a deal whereby the local population agreed to a full disarmament of their own ‘defence forces’, numbering several thousand men, and to begin talks over their full ‘reintegration’ into Azerbaijan. It has intervened to broker a cease-fire, the price for which is that, Russia gets to keep its peacekeeping force on the ground and thereby a foothold in Azerbaijan; and to push Western mediators, the EU and US further to the margins.
Cross
Roads of History & Geography
The
modern maps of the South Caucasus were drawn between 1918 and 1921, during and
after World War I. Currently, Armenia is mainly Christian, with 97 per cent of
the population belonging to the Armenian Apostolic faith, one of the oldest
Christian churches founded in the first century CE. Azerbaijan is 96 per cent
Muslim, with 65 per cent of the people adhering to Shia Islam and the rest the
Sunni faith. Four-fifths of Georgia is Orthodox Christian.
During
the Soviet era, the roughly 1,700-square-mile region Nagorno-Karabakh, whose
population has been predominantly Armenian was an autonomous Oblast of the
Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic. After the breakup of the Soviet Union in
1991, it was internationally recognized as part of the Republic of Azerbaijan,
which completely surrounded it.[i]
Back
in 1992, when the first war expanded to full-scale fighting, the foreign ministers
of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe met in Helsinki and
called for a conference to be held in Minsk to resolve the conflict. It was to
be attended by all parties, including ‘elected representatives of
Nagorno-Karabakh and others’—in other words, both Karabakh Armenians and
Azerbaijanis. But in the end, the conference never took place.[ii]
In
2017, the Karabakhi Armenians, encouraged by Armenian nationalists in the
region and the Armenian diaspora, formally renamed their region Artsakh, an
Armenian name dating back to the ancient times. The implication was that
Azerbaijan should give up on not just Nagorno-Karabakh but also surrounding
regions under Armenian control.[iii]
In
2020, however, the momentum in the conflict which seemed to have been frozen shifted
decidedly toward Azerbaijan, which won a clear-cut military victory over
Armenia during a short but consequential war over the territory which is widely
remembered in military circles for the devastating role played by the Turkish Bayraktar
drones against the Armenian tanks.[iv]
Unusual
Alliances at Play
The
long-running conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed region
of Nagorno-Karabakh has created partnerships in the South Caucasus that cut
across religious, ethnic, and geopolitical lines in surprising ways. Iran,
which is ruled by Shiite clerics, has provided an economic lifeline to
Christian-majority Armenia, whose primary backer has for long been Russia.
Meanwhile, Israel and Sunni-majority Turkey have formed a strategic alliance
with predominantly Shiite Azerbaijan. And the two Shiite-majority countries in
the mix, Iran and Azerbaijan, remain locked in a bitter, decades-long dispute
over territory and identity.[v]
As
Israel’s ties with Azerbaijan deepened, since 2016, it has received nearly 70
percent of its arms imports from Israel, which in turn purchases 40 percent of
its oil from Baku. Iran became concerned
that Israel is turning Azerbaijan into its proxy and using it as a launchpad
for operations against it including the 2018 theft of information regarding its
nuclear archive. In recent years, the growing proximity of Israel and the
Persian Gulf Arab monarchies have also been of concern to it. The Iranians now
fear that a similar dynamic is taking shape between Israel and two countries
with predominantly Turkic populations, Turkey and Azerbaijan. The perceived
threat of being sandwiched between an Israeli-Gulf Arab bloc to the South and
an Israeli-Turkic bloc to the North, combined with domestic unrest in Iran, led
to Iranian support for the Armenians. They also feared instigation of
separatism among the Iranian Azeri population.[vi]
Fallouts
of the War of 2020
The
War of 2020 led to 7,000 deaths in just six weeks of fighting. It also
re-shifted the ethnic balance in the region. On the one hand, by recapturing
area of Azerbaijan surrounding Nagorno-Karabakh, which had been devastated and
occupied by Armenian forces for two and a half decades, Baku’s victory allowed
hundreds of thousands of Azerbaijani refugees to return to their homes.[vii] For the remaining
1,20,00 Karabakh Armenians the situation was ever more precarious. The
three-mile Lachin Corridor, their only supply route to Armenia, a slender and
vulnerable lifeline was entirely dependent entirely on the small Russian
peacekeeping force, and by extension Russia’s relations with Azerbaijan, to
keep the road open.
Once
the war in Ukraine began in February 2022, Russia was distracted, and its
priorities in the Caucasus shifted. Azerbaijan, Russia’s main land route to the
South, became a more important partner than Armenia, its traditional Christian
ally in the region. This resulted in Azerbaijan sealing off the Lachin Corridor
in December last year.[viii]
Having
effectively lost control of Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol
Pashinyan stated saying publicly that Armenia had renounced its territorial
claims on the region. Instead, the formula he adopted in talks with Azerbaijan
facilitated by the EU was that the issue was now ‘the rights and security’ of
the Karabakh Armenians. In turn, President Aliyev frequently used the words ‘territorial
integrity’ and used the war in Ukraine as a cover. Western officials told him
that the territory would return to Azerbaijani jurisdiction but that patience
was needed. As recently as mid-September, he received calls from US and other
Western officials warning him against resorting to military force.[ix]
Domestic
logic also dictated Aliyev’s actions. For two decades, he has been the leader
of an authoritarian state. Hence why should he agree to Western demands for a
model of conflict resolution that compels him to offer autonomy to a national
minority community weaking his hold on power.
Moreover,
analysts feel that Aliyev believes that Turkey and Russia, not the West, are
the only powers he needs to take seriously. In the present case both Turkey and
Russia see the utility of limiting Western engagement in the South Caucasus, a
region where they have traditionally wielded influence.
Turkey,
Aliyev felt, would support his effort to take full control of Nagorno-Karabakh,
Russia would not prevent it, and the West, with very little leverage in the
region, would be a bystander.
Flurry
of Diplomatic Activity
In a
flurry of diplomacy in May 2023, the US, EU, and Russia all hosted peace talks.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken hosted four days of talks with the Foreign
Ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan and said they made steps toward
normalization and peace. Shortly after, European Council President Charles
Michel mediated discussions in Brussels between Armenian Prime Minister Nikol
Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and describing them as “productive”
talks.[x]
Then,
in late May, Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted a trilateral meeting with
the two leaders to discuss the reopening of transportation links between
Armenia and Azerbaijan, though no agreement was reached.[xi]
After
three days of US held talks on Nagorno-Karabakh in late June, Blinken applauded
‘further progress’ toward a peace agreement and said both sides showed a
willingness to negotiate seriously.[xii]
On
14 September a senior Biden administration official had said, “The United
States will not countenance any action or effort—short-term or long-term—to
ethnically cleanse or commit other atrocities against the Armenian population
of Nagorno-Karabakh”. Five days later, Azerbaijan launched its military
operation. On 21 September at the UN, the German Foreign Minister said, “The
displacement and forced exodus of ethnic Armenians from Karabakh are not
acceptable,” while the US Ambassador called for an international mission on the
ground.[xiii]
But
the fight for the rights of Karabakhi Armenians seems to be over before it
began. Presently it is difficult to imagine an
outcome that would protect their historic legacy and assure the survival of the
Armenians in Nagorno- Karabakh. The cost of their defeat will reverberate for
decades to come.
Nakhchivan
: The Next Boiling Point
A
potential outcome of Azerbaijan’s victory is the future of Nakchivan, an
Enclave of Azerbaijan between Iran, Armenia, and Turkey. Azerbaijan is
demanding that Yerevan agree to the establishment of a corridor through Armenian
territory that would connect Azerbaijan to Nakhchivan.
Such
a corridor would cut Iran’s access to Armenia as the two countries would no
longer share a border. Iran which views Armenia as a critical link with Eurasia
had threatened to use military force against any changes to the internationally
recognized borders of the region. [xiv]
Even
though most of its provisions lie in tatters, the trilateral Ceasefire brokered
by Russia in November 2020, and co-signed by Aliyev, Pashinyan, and President
Vladimir Putin has as one of its provisions, to Border Guards from Russia’s FSB
to protect the transport corridor across Armenia to Nakhchivan a region being
referred to as Western Azerbaijan.
This
is where the next battleground lies. It is felt by some that the UN backing,
should put this under a broader international umbrella but Azerbaijan and
Russia may resist this.
Conclusion
The
Karabakh conflict has been central to the modern national identities of both
the Armenians and the Azerbaijanis. Both sides still use language that excludes
the other: for example, the Armenians call Karabakh by the old Armenian name
Artsakh, implying a region without Azerbaijanis, and the Azerbaijanis call the
Armenian-populated town of Stepanakert by an Azerbaijani name, Khankendi.
The
return to violence is also a reminder of the failure to establish a European
security and rights framework for the South Caucasus. Western diplomats have
for decades backed an approach to Nagorno-Karabakh that is built on
international legal principles and modelled on the resolution of the Balkan
conflicts. In theory, such a settlement would involve international
peacekeepers, war crimes tribunals, political autonomy, and the eventual
peaceful coexistence of Karabakh Armenians and Azerbaijanis. Russian
commitments in Ukraine have also limited its capacity to project power in its
neighbourhood.
To
quote Lenin, “Having gone a full circle we are back to square one”. Once again
violence, not diplomacy, has played a role in determining key outcomes.
Unfortunately, the importance of history and geography in geo politics cannot
be ignored and small players take full advantage of settling lingering disputes
this when major players are distracted. The pulsating ripples of the Ukrainian
conflict have undoubtedly exposed yet another faultline. The mice play while
the cat is away.
[i] What is happening between Armenia and
Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh? BBC, September 20, 2023 https://www.reuters.com/world/what-is-happening-between-armenia-azerbaijan-over-nagorno-karabakh-2023-09-19/
[ii] Thomas de Waal, The End of
Nagorno-Karabakh, Foreign Affairs,
September 26, 2023 https://www.foreignaffairs.com/armenia/end-nagorno-karabakh
[iii] Ibid
[iv] Mohammad Ayatollahi Tabaar, Small
Countries, Big War, Foreign Affairs, April 10, 2023 https://www.foreignaffairs.com/armenia/azerbaijan-armenia-could-spark-wider-crisis
[v] Ibid
[vi] Ibid
[vii] Joel Gunter, Deserted
Nagorno-Karabakh reveals aftermath of lightning-fast Armenian defeat, BBC 04
October 2023 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66995976
[viii] As Armenia and Azerbaijan Clash,
Russia Is a Distracted Spectator, New York Times,
[ix] Thomas de Waal, The End of
Nagorno-Karabakh, Foreign Affairs,
September 26, 2023 https://www.foreignaffairs.com/armenia/end-nagorno-karabakh
[x] Nagorno-Karabakh Conflict, Council on
Foreign Relations, https://www.cfr.org/global-conflict-tracker/conflict/nagorno-karabakh-conflict
[xi] ibid
[xii] Ibid
[xiii] U.S. will not countenance any action
to ethnically cleanse Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh - Yuri Kim, Armen
Press, 14 September 2023 https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1119539/#:~:text=%22I%20want%20to%20be%20clear,acceptable%2C%22%20Yuri%20Kim%20added.
[xiv] Jim Heintz, What is Nakhchivan? And
after Nagorno-Karabakh, is this the next crisis for Azerbaijan and Armenia, 25
September 2023 https://apnews.com/article/azerbaijan-armenia-nagorno-karabakh-nakhchivan-51113f0439b51bbeeb7009bf067f205b
Major General Jagatbir Singh, VSM (Retd) is a Distinguished Fellow at the USI of India. Commissioned in 1981 into the 18 Cavalry, he has held various important command and Staff appointments including command of an Armoured Division.
Uploaded on 12-10-2023
Disclaimer : The views expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of the organisation that he/she belongs to or of the USI of India.