Conflict Between Azerbaijan and Armenia and Main geopolitical “Players” in the Region

 Conflict Between Azerbaijan and Armenia and Main geopolitical “Players” in the Region

By:   Tamari Zuroshvili. Research Fellow at the Center for International Studies

       Nika Chitadze. Director of the Center for International Studies

 

Historic overview

During the consideration the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, it is well-known that it was the first conflict which started on the post-soviet space in the beginning of 1988 when the council of Nagorno-Karabakh autonomous district declared about its separation from Azerbaijan soviet socialist republic and joining the Armenian soviet socialist republic. Ethnical clashes which started in the autonomous district of Azerbaijan later transferred to the inter-state conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan as a result of the integration of USSR and taking into consideration the fact that in 1994 Armenia-Nagorno-Karabakh forces managed to establish control over the 20% of the territory of Azerbaijan. Particularly, control was established on the territory of the formal Nagorno-Karabakh autonomous district and seven regions around the Nagorno-Karabakh. From this period Minsk Group within the OSCE (Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe) was established with participation of Russian federation, France and the US, but despite of Minsk Group efforts from one side and despite of the adoption several resolutions related to resolving the problem of Nagorno-Karabakh  conflict from another, it could not be resolved because of the fact that Armenia was requiring the Nagorno-Karabakh as its independent state de-facto integrated with Armenia. For example, the Armenian drum is in circulation on the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh. Furthermore, the flags of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh are almost the same. At the same time the Official Baku does not recognize Nagorno-Karabakh as a conflict side and by this way required that conflict was inter-state between Armenia and Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabakh was not participant in this case. Besides, the military clashes take place on the border (between Armenia and Azerbaijan) and also on the front-line every year and each year there are about 35 victims from each side.

It is known that the large-scale-operations on the territory of formal Nagorno-Karabakh emerged in April of 2016. During this period Azerbaijan armed forces managed to take control over several strategy hills and several villages, but later the conflict was stopped. Since September of 27, 2020 the large-scale hostilities started and has already been revealed that it is a real war between two states. The hostilities are still taking place in several districts of Nagorno-Karabakh, territories and regions around Karabakh, which before were de-facto under the control of Armenia. But in the event of an escalation over the conflict there is a possibility of bilateral fire will spread along Armenia and Azerbaijan border and of course, it should be real danger for Georgia and also for regional and global security related to this conflict.

Military Potential of Azerbaijan and Armenia

In this way should be presented some comparative analysis of economic and military potential of Azerbaijan and Armenia. First of all, it should be mentioned that with regard to military defense budget of Azerbaijan as to 2020 - it was 2 Billion 800 Million US dollars. With regard to the military budget of Armenia as of 2020,  it is about 1 Billion 300 Million US dollars. At the same time, a number of armed forces of Azerbaijan is about 110 000 military servicemen and number of armed forces of Armenia is about 50 000 military servicemen. With this military advantage Azerbaijan partly has some economic advantage before the Armenia.

Economic Aspects

Taking into account the economic conditions of two countries, it is necessary to point out that GDP per capita of Azerbaijan as of 2017 was 4131 US dollars, while Armenia’s is over 3935 US dollars. Here it has to be mentioned, the fact that Azerbaijan also has its state oil fund and amount of the fund’s financial reserves are about 35,7 billion dollars, which means that Azerbaijan has enough economic resources for conducting the military operations.

Main foreign players and their attitude toward the conflict

It is also interesting who are the main foreign players in the conflict of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Turkey

First of all, it is Turkey, because Turkey is the only state which openly supports Azerbaijan from the diplomatic point of view. Furthermore, it is expected military support of Azerbaijan taking into consideration the fact that Turkish army by its number is the second army within the NATO after the armed forces of the US. There are about 600 000 military servicemen which serves in army of the Turkish republic.

At the same time, at this stage the military support from the Turkish side is less expected, because of advantage of Azerbaijan army. At the same time, official Ankara is an active supporter of Azerbaijan on the diplomatic arena.

Russia

It is also necessary to point out about other players, particularly Russian Federation. It should be assumed that according to one version, Russia is a state for which it is more acceptable the prolongation of the conflict. By this way it implements the policy of divide and rule. It is not by accident that Russian president Vladimer Putin mentioned that Russia never interferes in the internal affairs of the neighboring countries. All this is primarily explained by Russia's interests. Russia supplies the both sides Armenia and Azerbaijan with the military weapons. Long time ago in the 1993 during the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh Russia delivered to Armenia military technologies with cost of about 1 Billion US dollars. Later, Russia delivered to Armenia antimissile systems S-300 and Iskander rockets. As it is known, today Armenia threatens about the possibility of using Iskander systems on the Azerbaijan territory. Their radius of action is about 500 kilometers. It is also known about the deployment of Russian military base N 102 on the territory of Armenia. Each year there are implemented joint military exercises with the participation of Russian and Armenian troops including the military exercises within collective security treaty Organization. From the other side it is necessary to mention that despite a fact that Armenia is a strategic partner of Russia, somehow for Russia it is not acceptable Pashinyan figure, because Pashinyan became a prime - minister as a result of Velvet Revolution in Armenia. He somehow tries to implement some reforms and to get rid of the Soviet style of ruling. It should not be forgotten  before Armenia was governed by the Karabakh clan with its soviet style of ruling and that style was more acceptable for Russia. Pashinyan figure is more pro-western oriented. Furthermore, it should be mentioned that joining by Armenia’s Eurasian custom union was implemented under the presidency of Serzh Sarkisyan, who was more acceptable figure for Kremlin.

From the other side, since 2010 till now Russia delivered to Azerbaijan the military weapons with cost of about 5 Billion US dollars. We know about also some preparedness of Azerbaijan to the possible war, if we take into consideration that for example in the Europe 2000 military budget of Azerbaijan was about 300 Million US dollars. Today as it was mentioned it is almost 3 000 000 US dollars. It is also interesting to mention about the Kremlin position, because in case of the prolongation of the conflict there are several scenarios. There are some possibilities that Armenia would explode oil and gas pipelines, which connect Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey with each other. We mean here Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline and Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline. They are located almost at the same territories. Furthermore, we know that it has been considered the implementation of the new trans-Anatolian gas project. For Russia it is not acceptable if the projects like TANAP (Trans-Anatolian Pipeline) capacity of which on the first stage is 16 billion and on the second stage 32 million cubic meters of natural gas can be implemented and by this way from Azerbaijan via Georgia to Turkey and later by TAP (Trans-Adriatic Pipeline project - capacity of which is 10 billion cubic meters of natural gas per year) natural gas will be transported. Furthermore, it should be mentioned Baku-Tbilisi-Akhalkalaki-Kars railway project, according to which at the first stage it is planned the transportation about 5 million tons of goods from Azerbaijan to Georgia and Turkey and then to Europe and within this project, at the second stage the volume will be increased to the 17 million tons of goods. For Russia it is not acceptable to implement such transport and energy projects which are not passing the territory of Russia as Moscow wants to be the only supplier of gas for Turkey in the framework of Turkish Stream and in the frame of Blue stream 2 pipelines. To gather them, their capacity is about 50 billion cubic meters of natural gas.

Iran

With regard to Iran, relations in the 90ies between Azerbaijan and Iran somehow have been deteriorated because of several reasons. Particularly, the first reason was that the Iranian state oil company was refused to be involved in Caspian energy projects on the territory of Azerbaijan. Secondly, Azerbaijan in foreign policy field was and still is more oriented on Turkey. Iran considered on the one side ethnical coincidence between Azerbaijani and Turkish people and the religious similarities between Azerbaijanians and Iranians from the other side - The main majority of Azerbaijanians are Muslim Shiites. Situation somehow has been improved several years ago during the meetings of presidents of Russia, Azerbaijan and Iran. The main purpose of the meeting was the construction of railway from Russia to Iran through the territory of Azerbaijan.

Official Tehran also takes into consideration the fact, that there are about 20 million ethnical Azerbaijanians on the territory of Iran near the borders with Azerbaijan.

China

There must be mentioned about China, who strengthens its positions in Central Asia and in South Caucasus region, where Chinese energy companies are involved in the different economic projects. Since 2017, free trade agreement between China and Georgia has entered into force. Official Beijing – as a main oil and gas importer country, is interested in Caspian energy projects, which are initiated by Azerbaijanian government. So, China as a new and active geopolitical player in Caucasus, is interested in the quick conflict resolution process.

USA and European Union

EU and USA are observing the situation and are interested in resolution of the conflict by peaceful means. Western countries are interested in the implementation of the alternative energy projects, bypassing the territory of Russia. At the same, both countries, Armenia and Azerbaijan are considered as a partner countries of the west. Particularly, both countries are the members of EU “Eastern Partnership” program and NATO program “Partnership for Peace”. Thus, west is interested in the conflict resolution by the principle “win-win”, which would maximally satisfy the interests of both conflict sides.

Georgia

During the discussion about economic factors, conditions, both, Azerbaijan and Armenia are the closest trade and economic partners of Georgia. For now, Azerbaijan has invested over USD 3 billion in Georgia. Further development of TANAP project (capacity of which prevails 16 billion cubic meters of gas) is crucial for Georgia. Otherwise it will hinder the transit potential of Georgia, until an open conflict will be resolved. Potential devaluation of Azerbaijan’s Manat and Armenia’s Dram will carry impact over Georgian Lari. Despite trade, these two countries are the main contributors to Georgian tourism sector. So far, if the conflict will last, the number of tourists during upcoming season will also be reduced in Georgia.

Furthermore, According to the preliminary data, the volume of foreign direct investments in Georgia in the first quarter of 2020 amounted to 165.4 million USD, which is by 41.7 percent less than the preliminary data for the first quarter of 2019. Due to the conflict in the region, most probably the volume of investments in the different sectors of Georgian economy would be more decreased within third and fourth quarters.

Conflict and the International Society

The Nagorno-Karabakh case is particularly interesting as it was the first ethnic conflict in the former Soviet Union. The main lessons to be drawn from the mentioned conflict

Nagorno-Karabagh unresolved conflict has some similarities and differences with other conflicts. The main similarity with i.e. Georgian cases is a Soviet heritage which was cemented at Divide and Rule principle. Another issue in this particular case was that the international society was not actively involved in resolution of the mentioned conflict. We can recall the OSCE Minsk Group which was created in 1994 by the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE, now Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE)) to encourage a peaceful, negotiated resolution to the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh. Unfortunately, international society thought that it was sufficient to resolve the conflict. However, it was not this way. The main mistake was that the status of Nagorno-Karabakh was not determined that time, which had to be based on the principles of international law, like non-interference in internal affairs of the state, territorial integrity, non-violence of the state borders, rights for self-determination (which not always means full independence of one nation) etc.

Conclusion

In general, there are several scenarios of situation development. From one side Azerbaijan can establish control over Nagorno-Karabakh and in this case they will not grant any autonomy to the Armenians on the territory of the Nagorno-Karabakh, because many Armenians will be exiled from there. At the same time, no negotiations for the abolishment of economic blockade for Armenia from Azerbaijan and Turkish sites will be held.

Secondly, there are some possibilities of gaining victory by Azerbaijan, but Baku will be interested in granting autonomy to the Armenians and for the promotion regional cooperation and stability the negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan related to the restoration of transport and communication systems between two countries will beheld.

According to one more scenario despite of establishment control by Azerbaijan over the Nagorno Karabakh and 7 regions around Karabakh, Armenia will somehow try to change tactic of resistance and will move for the conducting guerilla movement – especially in mountains regions and implement diversion attacks against Azerbaijanian infrastructure, for example oil and gas pipelines, hydro power stations and other type of critical infrastructure.

Furthermore, it is necessary to point out about other possibilities. Today Armenia is trying to implement attack to the territory of Azerbaijan, for example, a rocket attack on Ganja has been implemented. By this way Armenia somehow hopes that Azerbaijan will reply to this attack by bombing Armenian territories and not only military objects on the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.  This possible case can force Russia to involve in the conflict based on the collective security agreement, which gives some obligations before Russia to support Armenia according to the charter of the organization – Collective Security Treaty Organization. As it is known, Azerbaijan left this organization (together with Georgia and Uzbekistan) in 1999. In case of Russia’s open support next scenario could be the involvement of Turkey on the side of Azerbaijan and finally conflict may get some global character because Russia is a nuclear superpower and Turkey is the second army according to numbers of the military servicemen within NATO after the USA. In this case Armenia can also keep control over the part of the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh and Azerbaijan will always be in the preparation for the next war for the restoration of its territorial integrity.

In conclusion, the ideal version how the conflict can be ended is formula win – win by which Azerbaijan can restore its territorial integrity but from the other side Armenian population with high level political and economical autonomy will be granted.  Next issue is the ending of blockade of Armenia from Azerbaijani and Turkish side, that accordingly  will create convenient base for the regional cooperation in the middle and long term perspectives.