Armenian PM may inspire coup and delay settlement with Azerbaijan
Experts comment for Caliber.Az

INTERVIEWS  04 May 2022 - 19:56

A trilateral meeting attended by Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and President of the European Council Charles Michel took place in early April in Brussels and an agreement was reached to start preparations for negotiations on a peace agreement, as well as on formation of a Joint Border Commission by the end of April 2022. Despite this fact, Yerevan continues to derail the peace process.  So, over the recent days, the Armenian Armed Forces have become more active in the Kalbajar direction, where they are shelling positions of the Azerbaijani army. In addition, as Caliber.Az previously reported, the remnants of the Armenian gangs, have again started to carry out engineering work in the presence of the Russian peacekeeping contingent, which indicates that they are preparing for armed provocations. It is noteworthy that this happened amid a meeting between the Assistant to the President of Azerbaijan - Head of the Foreign Policy Affairs Department of the Presidential Administration Hikmet Hajiyev and the Secretary of the Security Council of Armenia Armen Grigoryan in Brussels.  

In this regard, quite logical questions arise, the main one of which is the following: why does Armenia, on the one hand, delegate its envoys to a meeting with a representative of Azerbaijan, and on the other hand, has actually stalled the process of a peace treaty and the delimitation of borders? The editorial staff of Caliber.Az asked former Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Tofiq Zulfugarov and Azerbaijani political analyst Farhad Mammadov to answer this question. 

According to T. Zulfugarov, understandable processes are taking place in Armenia - after the defeat in Karabakh, Yerevan is forced to imitate the desire for peace. 

"It is necessary for Armenia to improve its image in the international arena and protect itself, as they believe, from Azerbaijan, because Azerbaijan intends to bring the process of restoring territorial integrity to its logical conclusion. At the same time, the Armenian side openly declares that it intends to continue its, as they say, "Artsakh" policy under new conditions. Therefore, they make contradictory statements and their actions are also often contradictory.

On the one hand, Armenia continues the policy of annexation of Azerbaijani territories, and on the other hand, under the influence of Azerbaijan, Armenia is forced to comply with international laws.

When Azerbaijan offers principles of settlement that fully comply with international norms, the Armenian side declares that it accepts them as a basis, but then the settlement process rests on "BUT...". However, this "BUT" turns into the fact that, as a result, the meaning of the settlement principles is distorted. In other words, Armenians continue to interfere in the internal affairs of Azerbaijan in one way or another.

For example, the Armenian side says that Armenia wants to ensure the security of the Armenian population in Karabakh, but the point is that there is a Russian peacekeeping contingent there, whose function is to ensure the security of the Armenian population of Karabakh. At the same time, Yerevan sends its military units as "volunteers" to the territories located in the zone of temporary responsibility of peacekeepers. That is, in fact, the Armenian armed forces are present on the territory of Azerbaijan, despite the defeat to which they were subjected in 2020. In addition, Armenia carries out all types of programs, financing of some self-proclaimed entities, whose task is to carry out attempts to annex the territories of Azerbaijan and all kinds of sabotage. In fact, this is what is happening now on the track of the Armenian-Azerbaijani settlement. 

Naturally, Azerbaijan, in accordance with the stated position, is trying to show the attractiveness of a peaceful settlement by political means to Armenia. At the same time, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev stresses every time in his speeches that in case of violation of our territorial integrity and continuation of destructive policy by Armenia, Baku is ready to use force. In other words, our country applies a two-component policy," the former Foreign Minister said.
Our conversational partner further added that Russia and other external players traditionally use this conflict to create tools for interfering in the internal affairs of Azerbaijan and influencing its policy. 

"They consider this conflict as the tool for intervention, which has been carried out for 30 years. Of course, no one wants to lose this tool of influence on Azerbaijan, which in turn leads to the dual policy that we are witnessing today: on the one hand, a declaration of commitment to peace, respect for the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, on the other hand - practical actions aimed at preserving the hotbed of tension and conflict situation," - T. Zulfugarov said.

In turn, F. Mammadov noted that Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has never been known for predictability. 

"As before the 44-day war, nothing in this regard changed, so after the war. We have the experience of 2021, when statements were adopted in Moscow on January 11, where deadlines were clearly spelled out. A year and 4 months have passed since then, but there is no progress in the process of unblocking communications. Only work at the level of the intergovernmental commission has been carried out. 

As for the current situation, everyone has noticed that Armenia's rhetoric has changed after Pashinyan's visit to Moscow. The day after Pashinyan's statement in the National Assembly about the need to lower the bar set by Armenia on the status of Karabakh, EU Representative for the South Caucasus Toivo Klaar wrote on his Twitter page that he welcomed this far-sighted decision of the Armenian Prime Minister. That is, it became clear whom Pashinyan means when he mentions the international community. 

Now we have also come to the period when Pashinyan government had to make a decision on delimitation, but again the parliamentary opposition of Armenia started active actions, as it was last February. However, if decisions are postponed every time because of opposition activity in Armenia, it will not lead to anything good. I think that this message was conveyed to the Armenian side by representatives of Azerbaijan at the past meetings. This is also always stated by the President of Azerbaijan. At the same time, we see that the opposition activity in Armenia is not some kind of exorbitant or large-scale. Nevertheless, Pashinyan may inspire some elements of a coup d'état," the political scientist believes. 

According to F. Mammadova, the overall strategy of the Armenian leadership at this stage, is seen as delaying and complicating the process. 

"Fortunately, both the Russian side and the Western partners are already aware of all the subtleties of the current negotiation process between Azerbaijan and Armenia, and the deadlines that were noted both in the trilateral statements and in the statements of the head of the European Council Charles Michel were adopted with their participation. Therefore, Azerbaijan's unilateral actions will not come as a surprise to these countries and geopolitical centers of power," F. Mammadov concluded.

Caliber.Az