-Caveat Lector-
> KARABAKH, ABKHAZIA – WHERE NEXT FOR NATO?
>
> "Kosovo may become a next step in the evolution of a new European
> or even international order" Michael Lemmon, US Ambassador to
> Armenia, April 1999.
>
> It would have been unthinkable even a year ago to imagine the
> NATO alliance calling the shots in the former Soviet Union. But
> that may very well soon be the case. The Caucasus region seems to
> be bubbling up with many of the ingredients which led to the
> Kosovo conflict – plus oil.
>
> This report consist of the following three chapters:
>
> Introduction
>
> Armenia and Karabakh
>
> Georgia and Abkhazia
>
>
>
> First published: 19 June 1999
>
> The publications of the British Helsinki Human Rights Group do
> not express a corporate view. The Group is, however, grateful to
> the authors of its reports. Any views or recommendations
> expressed in the Group's reports are those of their authors
> alone.
> KARABAKH, ABKHAZIA – WHERE NEXT FOR NATO?
>
> It would have been unthinkable even a year ago to imagine the
> NATO alliance calling the shots in the former Soviet Union. But
> that may very well soon be the case. The Caucasus region seems to
> be bubbling up with many of the ingredients which led to the
> Kosovo conflict – plus oil. From the early 1990s, Western
> businessmen led by the US have invested billions of dollars in
> oil and gas exploration projects in the Caspian Sea and Central
> Asia. However, the way these resources reach Western markets has
> still not been satisfactorily solved.
>
> As well as the decrepit state of post-Soviet infrastructure,
> there are unresolved political problems in the Caucasus region.
> Separatist movements in Georgia and a dispute between Armenia and
> Azerbaijan over the status of the break-away region of
> Nagorno-Karabakh have made the choice of a route for pipelines to
> carry oil and gas to Western markets extremely problematic. Even
> though American relations with Iran have thawed somewhat
> recently, an Iranian route is still regarded as taboo by
> Washington.
>
> At the moment oil reaches the West via the Baku-Novorossiysk
> pipeline in Russia and the Baku- Supsa route via Georgia. But
> these are not ideal solutions: an explosion ruptured the
> Novorossiysk pipeline on 14th June and it was closed down. Supsa
> is a small-scale operation and can only cope with c.10% of
> expected capacity at the moment. The plan to construct a pipeline
> to pump oil from Baku to the Turkish port of Ceyhan in Turkey has
> hit many obstacles, including money.
>
> One reason why these projects are so unsatisfactory and why the
> costing is even more prohibitive than it need be is that they
> have to give Armenia a wide berth. Unlike the other Caucasian
> republics, Armenia has shown no desire to join NATO (apart from
> some participation in partnership for peace projects). It houses
> several large Russian military bases and recently updated its
> missile systems and took delivery of advanced jet fighters. It is
> widely accepted that Armenia came out of the war with
> neighbouring Azerbaijan in 1994 as the victor because it was
> supported by the Russians. Since then Armenia has been Russia’s
> closest military ally in the region.
>
> Neighbouring Georgia and Azerbaijan have followed a very
> different path. With Ukraine, Uzbekistan and Moldova they have
> opted out of the CIS security pact and formed a joint security
> alliance known as GUUAM. GUUAM’s founding charter pledges
> military cooperation within the group and also with NATO. At the
> same time both Azerbaijan and Georgia have taken steps to bring
> themselves closer to NATO itself. On 30th May Georgia became an
> associated member of the NATO parliamentary assembly and on 31st
> May Azerbaijan gained the less prestigious position of observer
> status. Azerbaijan has been asking for NATO membership for some
> time and some commentators say that a US military presence in
> Azerbaijan is inevitable.
>
> On 14th June, 1999 fighting broke our between the forces of the
> breakaway republic of Nagorno Karabakh and Azerbaijan for the
> first time since 1997. Each side blamed the other and, indeed,
> the incident may be no more than one of many skirmishes that have
> occurred since a cease-fire in 1994. Meanwhile, in early June
> Georgian and Abkhaz officials met in Istanbul to try to find a
> way out of the impasse that has existed there since 1993. There
> are signs that attempts may be underway to solve the smouldering
> problems of the Caucasus region once and for all – the US
> ambassador at large and special advisor to the Secretary of State
> for the newly independent states, Stephen Sestanovich, visited
> the Caucasus in May to set out the US’s position. But, while
> Georgia and Azerbaijan may be amenable to the West’s
> blandishments how can Armenia be brought on board without
> creating a confrontation with Russia?
> Armenia and Karabakh
>
> Negotiations over the status of Nagorno-Karabakh have been held
> sporadically since 1994 under the aegis of the OSCE’s Minsk
> process. Co-chaired by the United States, France and Russia the
> group has never wavered from the condition that Azeri sovereignty
> should, somehow, be preserved. This was the outcome of the Lisbon
> Summit in 1996. Indications that President Levon Ter-Petrossian’s
> was ready to accept the deal caused his overthrow by pro-Karabakh
> forces in Yerevan in February 1998.
>
> However, in March 1999 the Minsk Group seemed to change tack and
> now proposed the creation of a ‘common-state’ composed of two
> equal entities – Azerbaijan and Karabakh. The tables had now
> turned. While this solution was now an acceptable beginning to
> negotiations for the authorities in Karabakh, it was denounced by
> Baku. One of the problems was there seemed to be no precedent
> anywhere else for such an arrangement.
>
> In June 1999 BHHRG representative Chad Nagle visited Karabakh to
> discuss these and other issues with politicians and others there.
> The republic has a parliament of 33 deputies representing 4
> political parties: Communists, Dashnaks, Social Democrats and
> Liberal Democrats and is led by its president, Arkady
> Ghoukassian. Ashot Gulyan, the deputy Minister of Foreign
> Affairs, said that they accepted the common-state proposal as a
> negotiating tool although they didn’t like it. However, they
> seemed relaxed about the situation as they saw no likelihood of
> Azerbaijan accepting the proposal anyway. They were ready for
> compromise on the basis of the common-state idea, they said. Mr.
> Nagle felt that the republic’s government still had faith in the
> support of the Armenian government. But that may not last
> forever.
>
> The British Helsinki Human Rights Group monitored the recent
> parliamentary elections in Armenia . There they found people
> discussing the war in Kosovo and its possible ramifications for
> their own problems with Karabakh. Although most Armenians we
> spoke to could see no likelihood of there being any change in
> Armenia’s support for Karabakh’s independence, for the first time
> in visits made over the past four years the Group’s
> representatives noted that concern for the republic’s future was
> palpable.
>
> The victory of the Unity bloc in the parliamentary elections does
> not immediately indicate any change of tack, particularly as the
> new prime minister is thought to support a tough line on
> Karabakh. However, that may not continue. In an article in the
> newspaper Noyan Tapan, the Armenian commentator David Petrossian
> pointed out that when the ratification of the Armenia-Russian
> agreement on the status of military bases in Armenia was
> discussed in the parliament in 1997 only 11 deputies voted
> against or abstained of which 5 were from Sargssian’s Republican
> Party. Petrossian concluded that "in certain situations, there
> may be pro-Western and pro-NATO sentiments in the Unity bloc
> which, however claims to be pro-Russian".
>
> It may happen that the new government in Yervan seeks to edge
> closer to the West. Many think that the Armenia’s president,
> Robert Kocharian, will be side-lined by the new power structures,
> which will further isolate the government in Stepanakert. What
> sort of deal might be done?
> There are three possibilities:
>
> 1.Hostilities resume and Azerbaijan recovers the provinces lost
> in 1993-4 with Karabakh reintegrated into the country, but with
> extensive guarantees of autonomy.
>
> 2.The result of such hostilties is, again, that Armenia is the
> winner
>
> 3.‘Regionalization’ of the area whereby an international peace
> plan is brokered which redefines the Caucasian republics and
> their autonomous statelets along the lines of the Transcaucasian
> federation set up by the Soviets and which lasted until 1936.
> Apart from GUUAM, numerous projects are afoot to bring the region
> together, like the EU- sponsored TRACECA programme for improved
> transport links between Europe, the Caucasus and Central Asia.
>
> The resumption of hostilities between Azerbaijan and Armenia may
> indicate that force is again being reverted to as a solution to
> the impasse over Karabakh – each side blames the other for the
> fighting. But it may also be a way of forcing the issue and suing
> for peace.
> Georgia and Abkhazia
>
>
>
> Georgia’s president Eduard Shevardnadze has also been talking
> recently about settling the long-standing impasse over the status
> of the break-away republic of Abkhazia. Georgian and Abkhaz
> officials met in Istanbul in June to try to find a common
> position for negotiation. Georgia even claims to have
> humanitarian concerns over the c.250,000 Georgian nationals who
> fled Abkhazia when hostilties were at their height in 1992-3.
>
> However, members of the British Helsinki Human Rights Group who
> visited these refugees at camps in Georgia in January 1999 can
> only regard this as a cynical ploy: starved of aid,
> poverty-stricken and abandoned, their attempts to go home have
> been regularly thwarted by the regime in Tbilisi. Unlike the
> refugees in Kosovo, these people have been totally abandoned by
> the international community. [See BHHRG ‘An Alternative Report on
> the Human Rights Situation in Georgia’]
>
> On several occasions Shevardnadze has openly called for a ‘Kosovo
> solution’ to the Abkhaz problem. In his weekly radio broadcast on
> 7th June he said "The operation for coercing peace in Kosovo is
> based on principles ... which are fully acceptable to Georgia …
> these "principles" may become a significant precedent for a peace
> process in some other conflict zones, for instance in Abkhazia".
> On 10th June Shevardnadze quoted a senior NATO official saying
> "it is time we contemplated the possibility of internationalizing
> the peace process in Abkhazia" and, again, he talked about
> establishing peace by "coercion".
>
> Presumably, Shevardnadze is anticipating a NATO-led bombing
> campaign against Abkhazia along the lines of the alliance’s
> attacks on Yugoslavia to "coerce" peace. However , it is hard to
> see the comparison with Kosovo. In the equation "breakaway"
> Abkhazia is like Kosovo, while Georgia which wants to retain
> control of a rebellious province is in a similar position to
> Serbia. The reasoning does, however, illustrate the flexible
> nature of humanitarian intervention which, if it was to take
> place in this case, would involve taking a hammer to crack a nut
> even smaller and poorer than Serbia.
>
> That is, unless Russia intervened. The Russians not only helped
> Armenia to win the war against Nagorno-Karabakh they also helped
> the Abkhaz escape Georgia’s clutches. Would they sit back while
> NATO-sponsored interventions took place in its own back yard?
> There are two large Russian bases in Armenia and Russian troops
> are stationed in Georgia. On 15th June the Russian news agency,
> RIA reported that the Foreign Ministry had stated that
> "Azerbaijan should beware of "whipping up tensions in the
> Transcaucasian region", such attempts "are fraught with serious
> consequences". The statement went on: "We cannot fail to be
> alarmed by NATO’s claims to ascribe to itself the main role in
> settling conflicts outside the zone of its responsibility,
> statements concerning its intention to proclaim Transcaucasia a
> sphere of its interests. If NATO tried to create military bases
> in the region it would create a direct threat to Russia’s
> security on its southern borders and would upset the traditional
> balance of forces in the region".
>
> This warning may go unheeded. Both presidents Clinton and Yeltsin
> have only one more year to serve in office. Nobody knows who
> might come after them ? An isolationist in Washington or a
> Communist/Nationalist in Moscow - either could oppose NATO’s
> seemingly ineffible expansion eastwards. In which case there
> could be a blitzkrieg to ‘solve’ problems like Nagorno Karabakh
> and Abkhazia before power changes hands and which would involve
> another, but perhaps more dangerous, act of humanitarian
> intervention by NATO.
> Send mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with questions or comments about
> this web site. Copyright © 1999 British Helsinki Human Rights
> Group Last modified: June 20, 1999
<<Lets' see ... the original Kennedyan brought us: The Peace
Corps, followed by the Berlin Wall (28 years until it came
down), VietNam (mostly via Johnson, his Vice), the Bay of Pigs,
the Cuban Missile Crisis, 40 years of Castro ... all in the past
yet the legacy(ies) and problems carry into our present times.
And, gee, all this in about as much time as Gerald Ford was
President. What will the modern day Kennedian leave for today's
parents grandchildren? >>
A<>E<>R
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