EurasiaNet, NY
Sept 13 2008
LOUSY TIMING COULD OVERSHADOW TURKEY’S LOGICAL CAUCASUS SOLUTION
Liz Fuller 9/13/08
A EurasiaNet Partner Post from RFE/RL
Within days of the start of full-scale hostilities last month between
Georgia and Russia, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan
floated the idea of a Caucasus stability pact modeled on a 1999 Balkan
agreement.
But the diverging geopolitical and economic interests of the proposed
five members and the ambiguous status of Georgia’s breakaway republics
of South Ossetia and Abkhazia constitute seemingly insurmountable
obstacles to such an alliance.
As outlined by Erdogan, the proposed Caucasus Stability and
Cooperation Pact would bring together Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia,
Russia, and Turkey. His stated intention of discussing the initiative
with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon suggests that he envisaged the
UN assuming the role of "patron" in the same way as the European Union
did for the 1999 Balkan Stability Pact, which came in the wake of the
Kosovo conflict.
Turkish President Abdullah Gul endorsed Erdogan’s proposal one day
later, on August 12, saying the Caucasus pact would be "important for
stability in the region" and could encompass a mechanism for
addressing and resolving problems, presumably before they escalated
into violence.
There are, however, several fundamental differences between the
Balkans in 1999 and the South Caucasus in 2008. In 1999, the countries
of Southeastern Europe, including the Yugoslav successor states, had a
shared interest in integration into European and Euro-Atlantic
structures. Furthering such integration was one of the primary
objectives of the Balkan Stability Pact, together with preventing
further conflicts in the region; fostering peace, democracy, respect
for human rights, and economic prosperity; and stimulating regional
cooperation. In other words, membership of the Balkan Stability Pact
was intended as a win-win situation for all former adversaries.
Shared Objectives?
By contrast, the five proposed members of the Caucasus Stability and
Cooperation Pact have no shared objective or vision that would serve
as an incentive for setting aside their differences. On the contrary,
in some cases, such as the deadlock between Armenia and Azerbaijan
over Nagorno-Karabakh, their most important policy objectives diverge
or even collide, to the point that reconciling them is seen as a
zero-sum game.
Even prior to the August war, Georgia considered Russia the primary
threat to its stability. Now, having quit the Commonwealth of
Independent States (CIS) and severed diplomatic relations with Russia,
it would almost certainly make any cooperation, whether bilateral or
multilateral, contingent on Moscow retracting its formal recognition
of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states, which Russian
President Dmitry Medvedev has ruled out doing. Russia, for its part,
has no obvious interest in promoting any regional cooperation that
would strengthen Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia economically. Only
Turkey would stand to benefit immediately from a mechanism that would,
among other things, safeguard the export pipelines that bring Caspian
oil and gas to Turkey via Azerbaijan and Georgia. That traffic was
temporarily halted at the height of the August hostilities between
Georgia and Russia.
Two further factors cast serious doubts over the viability of the
Turkish proposal. The first is the Karabakh conflict, given that
Azerbaijani leaders have for years said that including Armenia in any
regional cooperation projects (such as the Kars-Tbilisi-Baku railway
that is currently under construction) is contingent on resolving that
conflict on Baku’s terms. In fact, it was the Karabakh conflict that
then-Azerbaijani President Heidar Aliyev adduced as the main obstacle
to a regional stability pact when then-Turkish President Suleiman
Demirel and his Georgian counterpart Eduard Shevardnadze first floated
the idea in January 2000.
The second factor is the exclusion of Iran, which aspires to the role
of a regional player. Addressing the Georgian parliament in March
2000, then-Armenian President Robert Kocharian advocated structuring
the proposed pact on the formula 3+3+2, meaning that Ruusia, Turkey,
and Iran as the countries bordering on the three South Caucasus states
should serve as "guarantors" of the pact, and the EU and the United
States as its "sponsors."
The Brussels-based Center for European Policy Studies unveiled in June
2000 a detailed "consultative document" that examined in detail the
optimum composition of a Caucasus Stability Pact, what issues it
should address, and how it might function. The preface denies that it
is modeled on the Balkan Stability Pact, but at the same time notes
the similarities (and differences) that then existed between the two
regions. The document postulated six chapters, three focusing on
relations among the South Caucasus states, including conflict
resolution and prevention and establishing a regional-security system;
and three focusing on broader regional cooperation that would draw in
Russia and the Black Sea and Caspian regions. It did not rule out the
inclusion of Iran in a Caucasus Contact Group that would discuss
implementation of that proposed agenda, and it took as a given the
involvement of such international organizations as the UN, the OSCE,
the Council of Europe, the World Bank and International Monetary Fund
(IMF), and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development
(EBRD).
Window Of Opportunity
Although eminently rational and stuffed with innovative ideas (such as
the introduction of South Caucasus Community passports), the working
document was not unequivocally endorsed by any of the proposed
beneficiaries, although Abkhaz Foreign Minister Sergei Shamba told the
co-authors in August 2000 that Abkhazia would like to participate "on
equal terms" with the other eight players. Iran for its part rejected
the inclusion of the EU and the United States, arguing for the formula
3+3, meaning Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia plus Russia, Turkey, and
Iran.
With hindsight, the window of opportunity for formalizing such a
Caucasus Pact began to swing shut in the summer of 2004, when Georgia
launched its first abortive effort to bring South Ossetia back under
its control by military force. That closure could possibly have been
reversed but for the confrontational policies and brinkmanship
espoused by the Georgian leadership vis-a-vis Moscow, the
unwillingness of both Armenia and Azerbaijan to make the concessions
needed for an equitable solution to the Karabakh conflict, and the
protracted standoff between the United States and Iran.
Meanwhile, the geopolitical balance has changed dramatically since
Erdogan resurrected the idea of a Caucasus Stability Pact one month
ago. Russia has formally recognized the independence of Abkhazia and
South Ossetia and is moving to cement closer military ties with both
entities. It could therefore insist on their inclusion in any regional
forum. President Gul has paid a landmark visit to Yerevan, thereby
paving the way for intensive discussions on the terms for establishing
formal diplomatic relations with Armenia. In response both to that
anticipated rapprochement and to the chaos unleashed by Georgia’s
strategic miscalculation in precipitating a war with Russia,
Azerbaijan is now tilting away from the West and toward Moscow.
This growing mistrust and incipient polarization suggest that at least
in the immediate future, the sole avenue for cooperation among the
countries of the region will be bilateral agreements. (Armenia and
Turkey signed such an agreement on energy supplies during Gul’s
September 6 visit to Yerevan.)
In the longer term, Dimitrios Triantophyllou of the International
Center for Black Sea Studies was quoted by the "Turkish Daily News" on
August 29 as suggesting the Black Sea Economic Cooperation
Organization — of which the three South Caucasus states, Turkey, and
Russia are all members — could conceivably "lay the groundwork, open
channels of communication, and provide the infrastructure" within
which diplomats from the five countries could address the political
differences between them.
Posted September 13, 2008 © Eurasianet