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  • Karabakh: Peace Deal Doubts

    KARABAKH: PEACE DEAL DOUBTS
    By Ashot Beglarian in Stepanakert

    Institute for War and Peace Reporting, UK
    March 9 2006

    The Karabakh Armenians voice their concerns over elements of a peace
    agreement.

    Following the recent unsuccessful peace talks on the Nagorny Karabakh
    dispute in Paris, the Karabakh Armenians are demanding a greater say
    in the peace process that will decide their future.

    Having kept quiet on the eve of the talks, the leadership of the
    territory is insisting that the Karabakh Armenians must now be allowed
    to negotiate directly with the government in Baku.

    "When Azerbaijan negotiates with Armenia and rejects dialogue with
    Nagorny Karabakh it is clear that they have one goal - to portray
    Armenia as an aggressor," Arkady Gukasian, president of Karabakh
    told journalists. "I regard that as propaganda. As soon as Azerbaijan
    begins negotiations with Nagorny Karabakh it will become obvious that
    Baku is moving away from propaganda."

    Gukasian said that he supported the peace negotiations chaired by the
    American, French and Russia mediators of the Organisation for Security
    and Cooperation in Europe but they should not be a substitute for
    "direct talks between the parties of the conflict" - which he says
    are Nagorny Karabakh and Azerbaijan.

    The Karabakh Armenians are currently excluded from the peace talks.

    Baku refuses to talk directly to them, saying that Armenia has
    annexed the territory of Azerbaijan and it will only negotiate with
    the government in Yerevan. The Karabakh Armenians says they are in
    a direct confrontation with Azerbaijan.

    Nagorny Karabakh proclaimed itself an independent state in 1991,
    but is not recognised by the international community and is linked
    to the outside world via Armenia.

    On this issue, there is a unified position in Karabakh. Parliamentary
    deputy and former general Vitaly Balasanian said, "It is illogical
    to keep silent when your own fate is being decided." Gegam
    Bagdasarian, a member of the opposition parliamentary faction ARF
    Dashnaktsutiun-Movement-88, said, "We ought not to have allowed the
    problem to move onto the Armenia-Azerbaijan plane."

    High hopes were placed on the peace talks in Rambouillet outside
    Paris last month but they ended without result and with mutual
    recriminations. The mediators met again in Washington this week and
    US officials are expected to visit Azerbaijan next week to explore
    new ideas.

    Since the talks failed, top officials in Azerbaijan, including the
    minister of defence, have said that if the peace process fails Baku
    reserves the right to go back to war to re-conquer Karabakh.

    The Karabakh military leadership said that they were ready to respond
    to this.

    "Naturally we are concerned by the militaristic declarations coming
    from Baku," said defence minister Seiran Ohanian. "However in terms
    of our equipment and modernisation our army is no worse than the
    Azerbaijani one and as head of the military I declare that we are
    ready to fight for every inch of our land. In case of necessity,
    our army is ready to organise defence, to counter-attack and make
    preventative strikes."

    At Rambouillet the Armenian and Azerbaijani presidents, Robert
    Kocharian and Ilham Aliev, discussed a peace plan which reportedly
    involves the phased withdrawal of Armenian forces from seven
    territories around Nagorny Karabakh, the introduction of peacekeepers
    and a referendum to be held at a future date on the status of Karabakh.

    The issue of status, which has been at the heart of the dispute since
    it began in 1988, again appears to be the biggest stumbling block.

    Karabakh's foreign minister Giorgy Petrosian told IWPR, "Any status
    lower than independence is unacceptable for us. The participation
    of the Karabakh side in negotiations is important and necessary,
    as there is a series of questions which cannot be decided without
    Nagorny Karabakh."

    Despite their closeness to Armenia, the Karabakh Armenians are also
    setting out a distinct position on a series of key issues under
    discussion in the negotiations.

    Rudolf Hairapetian, chairman of the parliamentary commission on state
    legal issues, told IWPR that holding a referendum was "a waste of
    time and money" because Karabakh had held one in 1991 and voted to
    secede from Azerbaijan.

    "In the 14 years which have passed since we proclaimed independence, no
    processes have occurred which suggest that public opinion has changed
    by a single iota. Any person on our streets can confirm that," he said.

    The Karabakhis also have worries about the prospect of withdrawal of
    forces from the regions of Kelbajar and Lachin that lie immediately
    between Nagorny Karabakh and Armenia.

    "All our rivers that feed the population of Nagorny Karabakh begin in
    Kelbajar," said political analyst David Babayan. "If it is returned to
    the control of Baku it will be easy to carry out an act of biochemical
    sabotage to poison the rivers. It is absolutely impossible to return
    the Lachin region, as it is our means of contact with the outside
    world."

    They also want to raise the issue of the Shaumian region which they
    regard as being part of Nagorny Karabakh but all of whose Armenian
    population was driven out by the Azerbaijani offensive of 1992.

    Following the meeting in Rambouillet, several round tables were held
    in Nagorny Karabakh to discuss the implications of the meeting.

    Human rights activist Karen Ohanjanian argued for greater
    democratisation, saying, "The international community is ready within
    the framework of international law to recognise self-proclaimed
    republics if they meet sufficient requirements."

    "We need to bring public opinion to the attention of the negotiators
    and always remember the price that Nagorny Karabakh paid for victory in
    the war," said Galina Arustamian, chairwoman of the Union of Relatives
    of Dead Warriors.

    IWPR asked 20 Karabakh residents for their views on the peace
    process. All were firmly of the view that Nagorny Karabakh should be
    given a direct role in the negotiations.

    "Diplomats ought to find the correct way to solve the problem by
    means of organising high-level meetings in Baku and Stepanakert and
    also between figures from the worlds of art and culture, historians,
    writers, workers, representatives of all levels of society in
    Azerbaijan and Nagorny Karabakh," said Arto Saakian, whose son died
    in the war of 1991-94.

    "It won't be possible to achieve any positive result at top-level
    Armenia-Azerbaijan meetings until Azerbaijan sits down at the
    negotiating table with Nagorny Karabakh."

    Most respondents agreed that Azerbaijani refugees ought to be allowed
    to return when a political settlement was reached. However, several of
    those questioned in the town of Shushi (which formerly had a majority
    Azerbaijani population and is known by Azerbaijanis as Shusha) were
    categorically against this.

    "The return of Azerbaijanis conceals the threat of a resumption of
    war in a few decades, as sooner or later they will begin to present
    their claims to the land and 'stab us in the back'," said Sanasar,
    an elderly resident.

    On the key issue of the status of Karabakh itself, most of those
    questioned said they favoured the return of territories from their
    control to that of Azerbaijan only in exchange for a guarantee of
    the independence of Nagorny Karabakh.

    Ashot Beglarian is a freelance journalist in Stepanakert, Nagorny
    Karabakh. The terminology used in the edited version of this article
    differs from that used by the author.
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