New Russian meddling in the Caucasus – POLITICO

Maurizio Geri is a former Center East and North Africa analyst at NATO’s Allied Command. Beforehand, he was additionally an analyst of the Normal Employees of the Italian Protection.

All through historical past, European powers have typically descended on Prague Fort within the Czech Republic to signal peace treaties and finish conflicts. It’s the website of the nineteenth century struggle between the German brothers and the place the Peace of Prague paved the best way for the tip of the Thirty Years’ Warfare – maybe probably the most devastating battle in Europe’s lengthy and bloody historical past.

Final fall, the medieval halls of the citadel served as an important backdrop once more, this time for the primary ever summit of the European Political Group. And one of many details of the agenda had been talks geared toward launching a peace settlement between Armenia and Azerbaijan, which might definitively result in a everlasting answer to the three-decade-long dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh.

On the summit, peace appeared extra attainable than ever, as Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev affirmed that they’d acknowledge one another’s territorial integrity and sovereignty and accepted the 1991 UN Declaration of Alma Ata as a foundation for border demarcation negotiations .

That is essential as a result of till then the Armenian management had by no means acknowledged Karabakh as a sovereign territory of Azerbaijan. However regardless of such basic progress, the fact after all turned out to be extra complicated. And whereas peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan remains to be potential, a brand new impediment now stands in the best way—and it is backed by Russia.

Earlier than regaining a lot of its misplaced territory in a swift six-week struggle in 2020, Azerbaijan was lower off from Karabakh for twenty-four years as Armenia’s navy presence turned the area right into a parastate backed by Yerevan. And because the finish of hostilities, Baku has moved quickly to reintegrate the area, with enormous sums invested in a large demining operation, and to date the primary 200 households 600,000 Azeris internally displaced from the primary struggle have already began to return.

Concluding Azerbaijan, who had been victims of the primary Nagorno-Karabakh battle within the Nineties, is a precedence for Baku – however there’s additionally a must accommodate and combine the area’s giant ethnic Armenian inhabitants, in any other case there may be no lasting peace.

Karabakh could also be Azerbaijani territory, however a major majority of its present residents establish as Armenian and right this moment stay within the unilaterally declared impartial exclave of Karabakh, which illegally broke away from Azerbaijan within the early Nineties. This breakaway state has by no means been acknowledged by a single member of the worldwide neighborhood – together with Armenia itself. However after three many years of self-rule, Karabakh Armenians are actually fearful about their future standing as an ethnic minority in Azerbaijan.

Assuaging these considerations and guaranteeing the rights, safety, and non secular and cultural freedoms of ethnic Armenians was a key aim of the Prague negotiations – and vital progress has been made. However only a month later, the temper modified dramatically following the intervention of Russian-Armenian oligarch Ruben Vardanyan.

Born in Yerevan, Vardanyan made his fortune in Russia through the decade of gangster capitalism after the collapse of the Soviet Union. He has been described because the “father of the Russian inventory market” and lower his tooth in funding banking earlier than sitting on the boards of a few of Russia’s largest corporations, lots of which are actually on Western sanctions lists.

Vardanyan left his birthplace in 1985 and lived for a few years in Moscow earlier than all of a sudden he renounced his Russian citizenship final November and relocated to Karabakh and have become the area’s de facto state minister. The oligarch had proven scant curiosity in Karabakh earlier than this level, however he apparently noticed a possibility to money in: Two long-dormant gold mines reopened simply weeks after his arrival.

The timing of Vardanyan’s arrival was unusual certainly. It got here simply as Azerbaijan was set to open talks with the area’s Armenian management, which signaled to negotiators in Baku that they acknowledged their future lay as a protected minority inside Azerbaijan. However now that Vardanyan is the chief, their stance has develop into obstructionist, with the oligarch and the federal government in Yerevan publicly opposing one another.

The concern is that Vardanyan will now use this affect to show public opinion among the many Karabakh Armenian neighborhood in opposition to peace, which might be disastrous for the pursuits of each Baku and Yerevan.

It begs the query: How did Vardanyan all of a sudden develop into so influential in Karabakh, and who helped him get to this place?

The 2 principal regional powers working within the South Caucasus are Turkey and Russia. The previous is a staunch ally of Azerbaijan, and whereas the latter has historically supported Armenia, Pashinyan has publicly criticized the Russian-led Collective Safety Treaty Group for not offering sufficient help to his nation – the transfer may be learn. as oblique criticism of the Kremlin.

In the meantime, Vardanyan is nicely linked in Moscow, which sees the South Caucasus firmly in its sphere of affect. All Russian oligarchs function on the mercy and favor of President Vladimir Putin, and for that reason there may be little question that Vardanyan is a Kremlin man – one thing the Ukrainian authorities acknowledged when it imposed sanctions on him.

Moscow, which is actively concerned in Karabakh, brokered a ceasefire deal that ended the struggle in 2020, and its peacekeepers have been stationed there ever since. Provided that the European Union has additionally been actively concerned within the peace course of, the Kremlin has a direct curiosity in not being relegated to its personal yard.

At the moment, Russian peacekeepers additionally patrol the Lachin Hall linking Karabakh with Armenia, a route that Vardanyan additionally makes use of to export his minerals – and Moscow’s peacekeepers don’t forestall these exports. However whereas the looted gold alone is unlikely to sink the peace course of, Vardanyan’s actions set a harmful precedent.

Simply final month, issues got here to a head when Azerbaijani activists turned out in snow-covered Lachin to protest the reopening of the mines, and the demonstrations prompted the highway to Armenia-controlled Karabakh to be nearly closed.

Worldwide condemnation within the press was fierce, as was the questioning of the legitimacy of the activists, who had been harshly accused of being government-sponsored. The international community has rightly centered extra on the consequences of the blockade on meals and medication provides – and there’s no doubt {that a} humanitarian disaster is underway. What’s much less clear, nonetheless, is the true gravity of the speedy scenario.

Initially of the blockade, Vardanyan took to the media and proclaimed his management with nice gusto – beginning with briefings for the Russian press. But, because it drags on, he’s more and more compelled to defend the aim and motives of his arrival in Karabakh at such a important time, in addition to the failure of Russian peacekeepers to clear the protesters from their path, as their mandate is to depart Lachin open.

The hazard right here is that every one this may occasionally lead different malign actors to see that the phrases of the Russian ceasefire and peacekeeping settlement usually are not well worth the paper they’re written on, growing the danger that troops, navy contractors and new landmines will roam freely above the regulation. additionally the borders of Azerbaijan. And if that had been to occur, the specter of a brand new battle would escalate dramatically.

This state of affairs is much from unlikely. The Republican Social gathering of Armenia, which dominated the nation for practically 20 years earlier than Pashinyan got here to energy, was dominated by Karabakh-born Armenians, lots of whom had been concerned within the first struggle within the Nineties. These people could now not maintain a lot administrative energy, however they’re nonetheless very influential and against any peace settlement. Ought to Russia determine to sabotage the complete course of, this difficult bloc may simply function a prepared proxy for realizing that aim.

A return to armed battle is just not in Moscow’s curiosity, however that doesn’t imply it needs peace both. The Kremlin would a lot moderately see a state of frozen battle in Karabakh, the place tensions may be elevated or decreased at Russia’s behest.

With its diplomatic, navy and political bandwidth consumed by the battle in Ukraine, suspending peace talks indefinitely would enable Moscow to hit the highway and re-engage at a time when it’s higher in a position to implement its personal phrases. He can thus retain the place of worldwide arbiter within the South Caucasus.

If the worldwide neighborhood needs to forestall this from taking place, it should begin basic peace talks between Azerbaijan and Armenia as quickly as potential. It may accomplish that by publicly holding Azerbaijan to its phrase that it’ll assure the rights, safety and heritage of Karabakh Armenians, whereas publicly holding Armenia’s phrase to ensure respect for Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity.

However regardless, the native inhabitants in Karabakh should perceive that there are two sides combating for peace right here – and neither Russia nor Vardanyan is amongst them.