Author: Boris Nahapetian

The anniversary of the 44-day Second Karabakh War that became victorious for  Azerbaijan, is approaching: three-quarters of the region returned to Baku, and a Russian peacekeeping contingent was deployed on the rest of the territory, where ethnic Armenians compactly live. However, the situation is far from being completely stabilized. According to some observers, there is a risk of a new military escalation – in recent months, shootings have become more frequent, both on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and directly in Karabakh, regularly resulting in casualties on both sides. In this article, we will analyze Baku and Yerevan’s positions, the main obstacles to sustainable peace and assess the prospects for achieving it.

What Baku managed to squeeze out of its victory

Victorious Azerbaijan is systematically promoting the implementation of the trilateral agreement of November 9, 2020. (Speaking about the fulfilment by the parties of the agreement provisions, we also mean the “war of interpretations”, which the parties permanently wage among themselves). Let us briefly list the goals that Azerbaijan has been able to achieve since November 10, 2020. The main achievement is the bloodless transfer of the Lachin (with the exception of the 5-kilometer Lachin corridor), Kelbajar and Aghdam regions to Azerbaijan. With the exception of a two-week hitch during the return of the Kelbajar region, when the Armenian side, through the mediation of Moscow, requested additional time (as it turned out, to burn property and cut down forests), the process went without delays and serious incidents. The Armenian armed forces were also withdrawn from the border areas of the Gubadly and Zangilan regions that were under Armenian occupation at the time of the signing of the trilateral agreement. This is rarely mentioned, but the trilateral document says nothing about these territories, and Armenia had to withdraw its troops from there under the military pressure of Azerbaijan.

Inaccurate maps and Armenian servicemen left in Azerbaijan

Another Baku’s goal – to receive maps of minefields from Yerevan – was achieved only partially, in exchange for a certain number of Armenian soldiers who were in Azerbaijani prisons. However, according to Ilham Aliyev, the accuracy of the transferred maps is only 25%. Therefore, the issue of the Armenian servicemen remaining in Azerbaijan and being considered saboteurs was removed from the agenda. Yerevan, which did not justify American and Russian guarantees regarding the fidelity of the maps, seems to have accepted the failure of the negotiations on the fate of its servicemen. Thus, the Armenian authorities have not yet brought up this issue neither at home nor in the international arena.

Transport corridor as a bone of contention

Yet, Azerbaijan has failed to achieve the opening of the Zangezur corridor. There are two main reasons why Azerbaijan and Armenia cannot come to understanding on this issue.

The first problem is the corridor’s extraterritoriality. In accordance with the trilateral agreement, control over transport communications between ‘mainland’ Azerbaijan and Nakhchivan should be provided by the border troops of the Russian FSB. Clause 9 of the agreement reads: “All economic and transport links in the region are unblocked. Armenia guarantees the safety of transport links between the western regions of Azerbaijan and the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic in order to organize the unimpeded movement of citizens, vehicles and goods in both directions. The Russian Federal Border Service secures transportation. By agreement of the Parties, the construction of new transport communications (highlighted by the author) will be provided, linking the Nakhichevan Autonomous Republic with the western regions of Azerbaijan. ” Baku evaluates these words as a strong argument in favour of the fact that transport links with Nakhchivan will have an extraterritorial status of a corridor. After all, if the Lachin corridor functions under similar agreed conditions and Armenians freely travel to Karabakh, then there must also be a Zangezur corridor, through which Azerbaijanis could freely reach Nakhchivan. The only difference is that in one case, control is exercised by Russian peacekeepers in Karabakh, and in the other – by the FSB border troops on the territory of Armenia. But Yerevan denies any “corridor logic”, insisting that nothing is written directly in the agreement about the creation of a “corridor”. Recently, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has reaffirmed this stance.

The second issue is the type of transport communications. Baku insists on both railway and road connection with Nakhchivan. Ilham Aliyev underlines the necessity of the road connection, while Yerevan insists only on the railway connection. Indeed, the trilateral agreement underscores the construction of new transport communications – precisely not one, but many and new ones. The railway communication between the mainland of Azerbaijan and Nakhchivan operated in Soviet times, and therefore this line cannot be called the new one. Azerbaijan refers to this fact, demanding the construction of a highway through Armenia to its exclave.

Failed withdrawal of troops from Karabakh

Another bone of contention is the issue of the presence of the Armenian military on the territory of the deployment of the Russian peacekeeping contingent. According to the 4th clause of the trilateral agreement, “the peacekeeping contingent of the Russian Federation is deployed simultaneously with the withdrawal of the Armenian armed forces. The duration of the stay of the peacekeeping contingent of the Russian Federation is 5 years with automatic extension for next 5-year periods if none of the Parties declares the intent to terminate the application of this provision 6 months before its expiration.” In fact, the withdrawal of Armenian troops from the peacekeepers’ deployment zone has never happened. Moreover, according to the Bulletin of the Russian Ministry of Defence of July 14, “On July 13, from 20.27 to 20.53, indiscriminate shooting was observed between the units of the armed forces of Azerbaijan and Armenia in the north-west area near the city of Shusha.”

This was immediately noticed in Baku. Later,  the peacekeepers changed the wording to “armed formations of Nagorno-Karabakh,” provoking even greater irritation among the Azerbaijanis, who perceived such an interpretation as an allusion to the subjectivity of the separatist regime. Baku recalls that the trilateral statement refers to the “withdrawal of Armenian troops”, regardless of whether these troops are the regular army of the Republic of Armenia or military formations from among the local Armenians. Thus, this situation provokes mistrust of the Azerbaijani side to the activities of the peacekeepers.

The status issue

Over the past 10 months after the war, Pashinyan has achieved a lot: he was able to win parliamentary elections, consolidate power and neutralize the threat of a military coup. The early parliamentary elections process gave Armenia a certain respite from the Azerbaijani diplomatic (but not military) pressure. Now that Pashinyan has strengthened his position as prime minister, Yerevan is putting forward the following thesis: “The conflict is not over, negotiations on the status of Karabakh should be conducted within the framework of the OSCE Minsk Group.” Ilham Aliyev, in turn, declares that the conflict is over, the status issue is resolved, and the OSCE Minsk Group can deal with humanitarian issues, for example, raising confidence-building measures and other issues of secondary importance from the point of view of real politics. The OSCE Minsk Group itself (represented by the co-chairs of France and the United States) is clearly unhappy with this formulation of the issue and wants to deal with the status of Karabakh. Russia,  the third co-chair, is taking a wait-and-see approach and proposing “not to fuss about the status” at least at this stage.

The issue of border delimitation became a problem for Pashinyan. While the prime minister was busy with domestic politics and elections, the Azerbaijanis occupied all the strategic heights on the border, putting the Armenian authorities in an uncomfortable position as they forgot to send their soldiers to guard the borders.  Baku is likely to increase pressure on Yerevan on this issue, pushing it to start the process of mutual recognition of borders, and, therefore, recognition of Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan.

Prospects for solving problems

In recent weeks, there has been a clear tightening of rhetoric on the part of official Baku on issues that cannot be resolved: on the withdrawal of Armenian troops from the territory of the temporary responsibility of the Russian Ministry of Defense and on the creation of the Zangezur corridor. The Ministry of Defense of Azerbaijan, the Foreign Ministry, and President Aliyev himself, declared the inadmissibility of the Armenian Armed Forces transfer to Karabakh through the Lachin corridor.

At the same time, Baku does not hide its concern about Armenia’s intentions to restore the army at the expense of military supplies from Russia. According to the Azerbaijani authorities, such a development will contribute to the toughening of Yerevan’s position in the negotiations with Baku and block the achievement of a peace treaty, the path to which lies through the mutual recognition of the territorial integrity. If Armenia prioritizes the issue of the status of Karabakh as a precondition (read, the independence of the separatist entity existing within the responsibility area of the Russian Ministry of Defense), peace in the region will not be achieved.

In planning their actions in the Karabakh direction, both Azerbaijan and Armenia are looking forward for the next five years. In less than five years, the question of extending the mission of the Russian peacekeeping contingent in Karabakh will arise. During this period, Yerevan will try to restore and reform, taking into account the lessons of last year’s war, its defeated army in order to have at least some aces in negotiations with military superior Azerbaijan.

Perhaps Russia will help Armenia in this striving, trying to restrain the strengthening of the Turkish positions in the region.

Baku also is not going to sit idly by. According to the leaked information, there are new large-scale Azerbaijani-Israeli agreements on military supplies. There are also reports about regular flights of military transport staff from Israel to Azerbaijan. In the worst-case scenario, the next five years the region will see an arms race, an outbreak of violence on the border and in Karabakh and intense diplomatic and information war amid the risk of an actual military conflict by 2025. If Baku does not get the Zangezur corridor, it is likely that the issue of the further functioning of the Lachin corridor will arise squarely. From a geopolitical point of view (especially if Moscow makes a decision to re-equip the Armenian army), Russia risks of pushing Azerbaijanis towards even greater integration with Turkey.

But there is also a more optimistic scenario, according to which Azerbaijan is provided with an extraterritorial Zangezur corridor that will operate, as stipulated in the trilateral agreement, under Russian control. Thus, all the guarantees that Baku gave on the functioning of the Lachin corridor will automatically remain in force. By ensuring the disarmament of Armenian militants in Karabakh, the Russians will become the only military force in the area of its responsibility in the region, tying Armenia even more closely to itself. Thus, Moscow will secure Baku’s favour on the issue of extending the Russian mission in Karabakh, and the risks of a new war in the region will be levelled. The question is which path Moscow will choose – turning the South Caucasus into a zone of economic cooperation and predictability, or preserving it as a region of chronic conflicts and instability to use it in its own interests and sell arms to both sides.