Who is writing the script for revanchism in Yerevan? Analysis of the scandalous report

Yerevan, Buzand Street, Building 3 — this address might not mean much to you. However, it is the location of the office of the Luys Analytical Center, an organization with ties to Armenia’s former president, Serzh Sargsyan, and still active today. Situated in the heart of the Armenian capital, just 25 meters from the government building, the office is almost in its shadow. The centre’s staff produces expert articles and reports on topics that concern the Armenian public, focusing on both domestic and foreign policy. Given its connections to previous Armenian administrations, these materials often contain, whether directly or indirectly, criticism of the current government.

Another such document was prepared by the Luys Center on October 10, 2023. The 17-page report, titled "The Alma-Ata Declaration and the Issue of the Territorial Affiliation of Nagorno-Karabakh," aims to challenge Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s statements that Armenia, by signing the Alma-Ata Declaration on December 21, 1991, had already recognized Azerbaijan's territorial integrity. The report also disputes the legitimacy of Azerbaijan’s accession to the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and questions the legality of the founding documents of the Commonwealth.

Caliber.Az might not have paid much attention to the report from the analytical centre affiliated with the former Armenian authorities, but, first, the document was referenced in the prestigious German publication Berliner Zeitung in its December 8, 2024 issue, casting doubt on Armenia's unified stance regarding Azerbaijan's territorial integrity. In fact, the article seems to suggest the opposite.

Second, we cannot overlook the lingering revanchist sentiments within Armenian society. It is unclear how either the old or new political forces would behave if they were to come to power in Yerevan today. As is well known, Pashinyan himself is unpredictable. For these reasons, to avoid misinterpretations and doubts, Caliber.Az has decided to examine the key points of the contentious report and conduct a legal analysis of its contents.

The report begins with a brief outline of several points, claiming that the Alma-Ata Declaration allegedly imposed no obligations on Armenia regarding Azerbaijan because Azerbaijan was not a member of the CIS until September 24, 1993. It argues that issues concerning the actual borders of CIS member states were first mentioned in the Commonwealth’s Charter, a document Azerbaijan did not participate in drafting. The report also states that Armenia ratified the Agreement on the Establishment of the CIS with certain reservations, without explaining why these reservations were not reflected in the final versions of the founding documents.

The early pages of the report provide a historical background on the creation of the CIS. It claims that the "three republics that were part of the Soviet Union, even if they were large ones, did not have the right to unilaterally determine the fate of the entire country" and therefore could not sign the Agreement on the Establishment of the Commonwealth on December 8, 1991. The report does not mention that the founding states of the USSR in 1922 were, in fact, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, and the Transcaucasian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, which was dissolved in 1936. The authors of the report indirectly conclude that since the Soviet Union did not cease to exist as of December 8, 1991, and on the date the Alma-Ata Declaration was signed on December 21, 1991, the decisions made on these dates were not legally binding. This argument seems to draw an analogy to a divorce process, where the actual date of the dissolution of the marriage matters far more than the formal registration at the civil registry office. However, by the time the Alma-Ata Declaration was signed, all former Soviet republics had declared their independence, thus recognizing the collapse of the USSR and, importantly, each other’s sovereignty.

As mentioned earlier, one of the central arguments in the report is the idea that, despite the signing of the Alma-Ata Declaration on December 21, 1991, by then-President of Azerbaijan Ayaz Mutalibov, Baku did not ratify the document in the country’s parliament. Therefore, the report suggests, that Yerevan had no obligations to respect Azerbaijan's territorial integrity. Additionally, the report argues that due to Azerbaijan's refusal to ratify both the Agreement on the Establishment of the CIS and the Alma-Ata Declaration, Azerbaijan cannot be considered a founding member of the Commonwealth.

But it’s not so simple. The fact is that none of the founding documents of the CIS, until the adoption of the organization's Charter on January 22, 1993, explicitly required ratification or approval by local parliaments, nor were there any established deadlines for such legal procedures. The decision made by the Azerbaijani parliament on October 7, 1992, to refuse ratification of the Alma-Ata Declaration (distinct from denunciation), which the authors of the Luys analytical report refer to, is indeed present in the country's legislative framework. However, its existence did not imply, and as time has shown, it was justified that the possibility of later ratification was excluded. To reiterate, no timeframes were set for such a process. A copy of this decision or any notification of refusal was not sent to the Commonwealth’s Secretariat, and Ayaz Mutalibov’s signature on behalf of Azerbaijan was not withdrawn. Moreover, the decision to refuse pertained only to the Alma-Ata Declaration, not the foundational Agreement on the Establishment of the CIS.

Armenia, represented by its first president Levon Ter-Petrosyan, signed the Alma-Ata Declaration and ratified both founding documents, thereby recognizing Azerbaijan's territorial integrity. In the preamble of the Declaration, Azerbaijan is listed first among the independent states that joined the Commonwealth. The document bears the signatures of 11 leaders of former Soviet republics, excluding the Baltic states and Georgia, with the latter joining the organization a little later. It is also evident that Levon Ter-Petrosyan, in signing such an important document, could not have known when Azerbaijan would ratify it.

Immediately after completing all the formalities, the presidents of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Ukraine held a press conference at the House of Friendship in Kazakhstan’s capital. The event was chaired by the now-former president of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev. Notably, after announcing to the press the signing of the Declaration, Russian President Boris Yeltsin asked Nazarbayev to list all 11 Commonwealth states. As expected, Azerbaijan was mentioned first. This highlights the point that well-known and widely recognized facts in jurisprudence do not require further proof.

Why does the Luys Center's report devote so much attention to the Alma-Ata Declaration and the Agreement on the Establishment of the CIS? The reason lies in the fact that both documents contain provisions that require all member states of the Commonwealth to respect each other's territorial integrity and the inviolability of existing borders. However, there is no mention of the right of nations or peoples to self-determination, except in the context of the self-determination of former Soviet republics from decisions made by the central authority in the past, that is, Moscow. This interpretation was expressed by Boris Yeltsin at the same press conference, where he stated that from then on, all former Soviet republics were independent of Moscow, and their territorial integrity was inviolable.

An interesting point is that the very first question at the event was not about how to move forward in the context of restored sovereignty, but about Armenia's respect for human rights. The question was posed directly to the Armenian president. In his characteristic concise manner, Levon Ter-Petrosyan responded that there were no problems with human rights or the rights of national minorities in Armenia. As we can see, the Armenian authorities were already displaying a high level of hypocrisy, as by that time, approximately 250,000 Azerbaijanis had been forced to leave their homes in what is now Armenia. Moreover, during the same period in December 1991, Armenian paramilitary groups were carrying out violent actions against local residents in the village of Meshali in the Khojaly district of Azerbaijan, burning their homes and property. It is worth noting that one of the instigators of the Meshali events, Vagif Khachatryan, was arrested in 2023 as part of a criminal case and sentenced by the Baku Military Court to 15 years in prison.

But let's return to the report. The authors' reference to the decision of the Supreme Council of the Republic of Armenia on February 18, 1992, in which the Agreement on the Establishment of the CIS was ratified with reservations, does not stand up to scrutiny. Article 10 of the Agreement does indeed provide for the possibility of amending or supplementing the text of the agreement, but only by mutual consent of the parties. None of the amendments or reservations put forward by the Armenian side, as they call them, were ultimately accepted. However, this detail is conveniently omitted in the report, as is the content of these proposed amendments, which has been kept secret for many years. Nevertheless, we learn about the reservations proposed by Armenia during the ratification of the Agreement from an interview with a prominent member of the Republican Party of Armenia, Armen Ashotyan.

According to the politician, the preamble of the Agreement proposed replacing the phrase "inalienable right to self-determination" with "right of peoples to self-determination." Additionally, the first paragraph of Article 5 was planned to be reworded as follows: "The High Contracting Parties acknowledge and respect each other's territorial integrity and the inviolability of existing borders within the Commonwealth." Do we see these changes in the current version of the Agreement? Of course, no. There is no mention of the right of nations to self-determination in the text of the Agreement, and the Armenian revanchist stance of interpreting it as they see fit is completely inconsistent with international law.

Fully aware of this, the experts from the Luys Center then attempt to present the CIS Charter of January 22, 1993, as a more significant document, one that supposedly regulates the issue of territorial integrity among the member states of the Commonwealth. However, in doing so, they unknowingly fall into a trap. The Charter is the first document to explicitly require ratification, and it must be ratified within one year from the date of signing. Otherwise, it will not be considered in effect.

Yes, Azerbaijan did indeed join the Charter among the last, after the return of national leader Heydar Aliyev to leadership in the republic, specifically on September 24, 1993, during a meeting of the CIS heads of state. However, Azerbaijan ratified the Charter only two and a half months later—on December 14, 1993—while Armenia managed to complete this task only by March 16, 1994, nearly 14 months after its adoption. The question of who is a full member of the CIS and who is not after this becomes quite significant.

Meanwhile, the CIS Charter, in Articles 41 and 42, explicitly allowed for amendments and reservations to its text, but such reservations were made only by Moldova and Belarus, primarily concerning their own competencies. Armenia, however, did not exercise its right to propose amendments to the Charter.

The Luys report also references a decision by the CIS Economic Court dated March 31, 1994, noting that the descriptive section of the document does not list Azerbaijan as a founding state of the CIS, as it joined the Commonwealth under Part 3 of Article 7 of the Charter on September 24, 1993, following the consent of all founding states, which at the time numbered 10.

Once again, the Armenian side cherry-picks clauses from legal and normative documents to suit its narrative. However, even a cursory review of the aforementioned CIS Economic Court decision reveals the following:

Firstly, all founding states are member states of the Commonwealth. Their status as founders grants them only the authority to admit new members or participants to the CIS; in all other respects, their rights are identical.

Secondly, the Charter explicitly states that "the Agreement of December 8, 1991, and the Protocol to it of December 21, 1991, are primary in relation to the Charter of the Commonwealth of Independent States since they are constituent documents of the Commonwealth based on which the Charter is accepted." Therefore, any attempt by the Armenian side to distort the CIS legal framework is doomed to fail.

Thirdly, in any legal document, the operative part is the defining one. The CIS Economic Court, for its part, decided to consider the Republic of Azerbaijan, the Republic of Armenia, and others listed as member states of the Commonwealth of Independent States following the entry into force of the CIS Charter.

Fourthly, and perhaps most importantly for Azerbaijan, it might actually be beneficial that we are not considered one of the founding states of the CIS. After all, as we have just established, unanimous consent of all founding states is required to admit new members to the Commonwealth. On September 24, 1993, such unanimous consent was granted. The first signature on the document was that of Armenian President Levon Ter-Petrosyan—without any reservations or amendments. This serves as yet another affirmation from Armenia of that era regarding the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan within its internationally recognized borders.

To recall, Azerbaijan, alongside Armenia and other former Soviet republics, became a full member of the United Nations on March 2, 1992. The territorial integrity of Azerbaijan was never questioned within the United Nations framework.

The report by the Luys Analytical Center, which also positions itself as a charitable foundation, raises concerns with its reference to the decision of the Supreme Council of Armenia (now the National Assembly of the Republic of Armenia) dated July 8, 1992. This decision officially prohibits Armenia from signing any international agreement or treaty that recognizes "Nagorno-Karabakh" as an integral part of Azerbaijan. Notably, the analysis highlights Levon Ter-Petrosyan's refusal to sign the Declaration "On respect for sovereignty, territorial integrity and immunity of borders of the State Parties of the Commonwealth of Independent States," dated April 15, 1994, precisely on this basis. It appears that this regulation remains in effect to this day, as no evidence to the contrary exists.

The 1995 Constitution of the Republic of Armenia effectively enshrined the earlier provision and, at the highest level, reflected Armenia's territorial claims against Azerbaijan by including a direct reference to the Declaration of Independence dated August 23, 1990, in the text of the country’s fundamental law.

Instead of shedding light (which is how luys translates from Armenian) on Armenia’s highly vulnerable position, the authors of the report seek to fan the flames of revanchism. The document notably emphasizes that Pashinyan’s acceptance of the Alma-Ata Declaration as a foundational document for normalizing relations with Azerbaijan holds no significance for the issue of "Nagorno-Karabakh."

The arguments presented in the report clearly indicate otherwise. Nikol Pashinyan’s policy towards Azerbaijan is disingenuous. He cannot be unaware of the Armenian Supreme Council's decision from July 8, 1992, and is well-informed about the territorial claims against Azerbaijan enshrined in his country’s Constitution. Yet, he persistently denies the obvious. Could Pashinyan resort to the tools crafted within close proximity to the government’s walls if the need arises to retreat on the negotiation track? Undoubtedly, yes, given Pashinyan’s exceptional skill in rhetorical manoeuvring. Rolling back from his current position would pose no significant challenge for him.

Can a peace treaty be signed under such circumstances? Clearly, considering the above, Azerbaijan cannot afford such a step without Armenia implementing constitutional amendments. Such a move would be reckless and risky, planting a ticking time bomb beneath future generations of Azerbaijanis.

Only a revision or adoption of a new Armenian Constitution, devoid of even the slightest hint of disrespect for Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity, can ensure lasting peace in the region. This would strip Armenia of the legal means to pursue revanchist policies in the future.

By Samir Guliyev