ARMENIAN PAPER SCOFFS AT WEST’S STANCE ON KARABAKH SETTLEMENT
Armenian newspaper 168 Zham, Yerevan
3 Aug 06
Excerpt from report by Armen Bagdasaryan in Armenian newspaper 168
Zham on 3 August headlined "The unsettled conflict is only an argument"
For the first time in 12 years since the process of settlement of
the Karabakh conflict has started, the West says that the Armenian
and Azerbaijani authorities do not in fact want to reach final peace
because the unsettled conflict gives them an opportunity to use it as
an argument to postpone democratic reforms. In other words, the West
makes public the fact which Armenian and Azerbaijani societies knew
long time ago. Of course, it does not mean that the West has realized
this now. But they decided to make this public today. That is to say,
an emphasis of the world community has changed.
If previously the world community used to persuade us that in case
of final settlement of the conflict Armenia and Azerbaijan will have
huge economic benefits, today instead of economic benefits they
suggest democracy to us: settle the conflict and your states will
become really democratic. We have a vicious circle: the conflict
will not be resolved until Armenia and Azerbaijan are democratic,
but on the other hand, our states will not become democratic until
the conflict is resolved. What to do?
The point is that up to now the world community has not said why the
negotiations that have been lasting for 12 years yield no results.
The problem is not in difference of approaches or a dispute over the
stage-by-stage or the package option for the settlement. The problem
is that purposes of the two sides are absolutely different. The
position of the Armenian side is known: Karabakh should not be ruled
directly from Azerbaijan, it should have international guarantees
of security and a reliable ground link with Armenia. The position
of the Azerbaijani side is also known: Armenians should not live in
Karabakh, although this position has not been officially announced.
[Passage omitted: in Soviet times late Azerbaijani President Heydar
Aliyev managed to expel Armenians from the exclave of Naxcivan but
failed to do the same in Karabakh.]
Briefly, the purposes are absolutely contradictory, and it is clear
that it will be impossible to reach settlement in this case. Thus, we
should first agree on purposes. We are sure that the world community
should try to coordinate the purposes. That is to say, it should be
said that Armenians live in Karabakh and will continue to live there.
What is necessary should be discussed only after that. For instance,
it should be discussed whether Armenians’ secure life in Karabakh
is possible without a status of an independent state and without
a reliable ground link with Armenia; if full military and economic
security is possible without an army, constitution, own currency and
so on. [Passage omitted: reiteration]
As for democracy, it in fact has nothing to do with the "neither
war nor peace" situation. Israel, which has been in the situation of
a permanent war for 60 years, is a democratic state. It is another
problem that our authorities do not want to see this example. One
can understand them though: a son of a senior Israeli official was
wounded in a military operation several days ago. An example of this
kind could hardly encourage our authorities.