Germany sums up Karabakh

Orkhan Sattarov, the head of the European Bureau of Vestnik Kavkaza

“The Armenian regular army stays in Karabakh; while the readiness of Armenia for withdrawal from occupied Azerbaijani territories is the main sign of progress in the talks,” official Berlin thinks. Yerevan won’t like the replies of the German government on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

Ahead of a visit by German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier to Yerevan and Baku, one of the key topics of which will be the Nagorno-Karabakh problem, the German government prepared and published answers to a request by Die Linke on the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict. Vestnik Kavkaza publishes the most interesting parts of the official document.

Members of the parliament asked official Berlin who the sides in the Nagorno-Karabakh are, and the government answered: “The federal government considers the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict an international conflict between the Republic of Armenia and the Azerbaijani Republic.” Thus, Germany makes it clear that years-long efforts of Armenian diplomacy to present the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict as a war of Azerbaijan against “the people of Karabakh” didn’t cause the desired effect in Europe.

Moreover, the German government says (original quotation marks): “The Self-Defense Forces” of the so-called “Nagorno-Kerebakh Republic” have 23 thousand soldiers. 8 thousand of them are soldiers of the regular army of the Republic of Armenia. The main part of the “Self-Defense Forces” consists of recruits from Armenia.” So, Berlin directly states that the so-called Karabakh “self-defense army” is only a cover for the regular army of Armenia.

The German government gives certain statistics on the military expenditures of Azerbaijan and Armenia. They confirm that the share of military expenditures of Yerevan in comparison with the Armenian budget is greater that the share of military expenditures of Baku in comparison with the Azerbaijani budget. In 2009 military expenditures of Azerbaijan took 9.7 percent of the republic’s budget; 2010 – 8.7 percent; 2011 – 13.5 percent; 2012 – 12.7 percent; 2013 – 11.4 percent. In Armenia military expenditures in 2009 took 12 percent of the budget; 2010 – 17.2 percent; 2011 – 16 percent; 2013 – 15.5 percent; 2014 – 25.6 percent.

It is interesting that the Armenian side regularly raises the question of “massive militarization of Azerbaijan” at different international platforms; but the statistics presented by Germany say that Yerevan makes more efforts for its militarization.

Die Linke also asked whether the military treaty between Armenia and Russia, which was prolonged in 2010, guaranteed the security of the unrecognized authorities of Nagorno-Karabakh. The German government answered that, according to its information, the military treaty covers only the territory of Armenia.

Official Berlin touched on the talks based on the Madrid principles, which is actually deadlocked: “If the Armenian side shows real readiness to withdraw at least from some occupied territories outside Nagorno-Karabakh, according to the federal government of Germany, it will be an argument for Azerbaijan to follow other Madrid principles. For instance, it concerns giving legal guarantees of security to the Armenian population of Nagorno-Karabakh,” Berlin thinks.

Speaking about the possible opening of Khodjaly airport by the unrecognized Karabakh authorities, the German government actually repeated the position of the co-chairs of the OSCE Minsk Group, who think that Armenia and Azerbaijan should avoid all actions which could worsen the situation in the region.

The federal government also points out the very low level of living standards in Nagorno-Karabakh and the neighboring regions. “The population which lives there in difficult conditions has only limited access to elementary social services,” the document says. The German government states that Azerbaijani graveyards in Nagorno-Karabakh and neighboring territories which are occupied by the Armenians are not kept in order and could disappear as memorial places of identity formation.