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Talks Conclude As Azerbaijan Threatens Armenia With Military Action

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  • Talks Conclude As Azerbaijan Threatens Armenia With Military Action

    TALKS CONCLUDE AS AZERBAIJAN THREATENS ARMENIA WITH MILITARY ACTION
    Lilit Gevorgyan

    World Markets Research Centre
    Global Insight
    Nov 23 2009

    Armenian President Serzh Sargsian and his Azerbaijani counterpart,
    Ilham Aliyev, met on 22 November 2009 in Germany for Organisation for
    Security Co-operation in Europe (OSCE)-mediated talks over the status
    of the breakaway Azeri region of Nagorno Karabakh. One day earlier,
    Aliyev stated that if this round of talks fails to bring concrete
    results, Azerbaijan would resort to military action to reclaim its
    breakaway region. The talks, chaired by OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs from
    Russia, France and the United States, lasted four hours and ended with
    no comments from either president. However, the OSCE French co-chair,
    Bernard Fassier, noted that the parties were actively engaged during
    the talks. Neither the OSCE nor the Armenian side commented on Aliyev's
    threats of military action.

    Significance:It is not the first time that Aliyev has issued threats of
    a military resolution in Nagornon Karabakh, an Armenian enclave within
    Azerbaijan that declared independence over 15 years ago to become
    a de facto part of Armenia. However, unlike his previous statements
    mainly aimed at bolstering his militaristic image domestically and
    with little chance of happening, Aliyev's recent threats of war may be
    more dangerous. The statement comes in the wake of a shifting balance
    of power in the South Caucasus, most notably the Armenian-Turkish
    protocols on establishing diplomatic relations and opening the common
    border closed by Turkey in solidarity with Azerbaijan over the Nagorno
    Karabakh conflict (seeArmenia-Turkey: 12 October 2009:). There are
    a number of motivations behind Aliyev's war threats. First, it is an
    attempt to stall the OSCE Minsk process, which has made little progress
    since the early 1990s, but at least achieved a detailed peace roadmap
    that envisages concessions from both Armenia and Azerbaijan. By issuing
    an ultimatum to the OSCE, Aliyev hopes to rearrange the peace talks
    format by bringing in Turkey, Azerbaijan's closest ally and ethnic
    kin, and thus increase the pressure on the Armenian side in the hope
    of a resolution with no concessions. Secondly, Aliyev is unhappy with
    the recent diplomatic thaw in relations between Armenian and Turkey;
    as a result he may try to sabotage the Armenia-Turkey process. By
    resuming the military conflict in Nagorno Karabakh, Aliyev may try
    to block the reopening of the Armenian-Turkish border by bolstering
    anti-Armenian sentiment among Turkish secularists and the military
    (seeAzerbaijan: Turkey: 5 November 2009:). While an all-out war is
    unlikely in the immediate term, at least during the winter months,
    the frequency of border incidents and small-scale military clashes
    between Armenian and Azeri soldiers is likely to intensify. Aliyev,
    who has been pouring millions of dollars into strengthening the Azeri
    army over the past decade, has to consider more carefully the economic
    impact of a possible war--Azerbaijan's most profitable Baku-Ceyhan oil
    export pipeline runs only 30 kilometres away from the conflict zone.
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