Nagorno-Karabakh: when both guns and diplomats are negotiating

In the last few days the conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh has been developing in two dimensions simultaneously: there are shootings on the contact line between Armenian and Azerbaijani troops, while the representatives of the OSCE Minsk Group and the Foreign Ministers of Armenia and Azerbaijan are negotiating on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York to resolve the conflict.

The first heavy fighting occurred on Friday, on the eve of the meeting of the foreign ministers of Azerbaijan and Armenia, Elmar Mammadyarov and Edward Nalbandian. The fighting launched by the Armenian side turned into an exchange of artillery fire, which killed four Armenian soldiers and one Azerbaijani soldier. The Armenian Defense Ministry issued an official message about the beginning of use of artillery and missiles on the contact line in order to "contribute to the negotiation process."

This document also mentioned that the Armenian armed forces will be "keeping the placements of the units of the Azerbaijani Armed Forces, all movements of troops, military equipment and manpower under constant bombardment." Meanwhile, Elmar Mammadyarov drew the attention of the participants in New York to the fact that Armenia "in every possible way prevents contacts between the Azerbaijani and Armenian communities of the Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan," and calls on Yerevan to withdraw its troops from the occupied territories.

A reply was made on the same day, but not from the mouth of Edward Nalbandian: Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan assured the audience that Armenia is "among the most militarized areas of the planet."

"If Armenia won't withdraw from the occupied territories, Azerbaijan will take all necessary steps to restore its territorial integrity, sovereignty and to ensure the inviolability of its borders. All responsibility for any step that will be taken by the state-occupier and aggressor fully lies with Armenia," Mammadyarov warned.

Sargsyan's phrase "when I say Armenia, Nagorno-Karabakh is an integral part of it" was a bombshell. For the first time the Pesident of Armenia, whose state's position is the absence of territorial claims against Azerbaijan, with the support of the self-proclaimed and unrecognized 'Nagorno-Karabakh Republic', voiced these claims, including on a part of the territory recognized by the international community as belonging to Azerbaijan.

While experts wondered why Sargsyan undid decades of work of the mediators on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with one statement and recognized the fact of occupation of Azerbaijani lands, a meeting of the presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia before the end of 2015 was agreed in New York with the participation of the OSCE Minsk Group, despite the provocative actions. Meanwhile, the provocations continued, there was another battle in which three Azerbaijani soldiers and seven Armenian soldiers were killed.

A political scientist and MP of the Azerbaijani Majlis, Rasim Musabekov, told Vestnik Kavkaza that he sees a direct connection between the firing on the contact line of troops and the diplomacy in New York. "As long as the negotiating process is stalled due to the unacceptable claims of Armenia, which refuses to withdraw its troops from the occupied Azerbaijani territories, we can expect that the situation on the contact line will continue to deteriorate," he warned.

"Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov stated that the problem is not a lack of confidence or a mechanism to identify violations of the ceasefire. The ceasefire has been calculated for almost a month to allow the parties to reach an agreement and Armenia to withdraw its troops from the occupied territories. The problem is that it's been more than 20 years, and nothing has changed. Moreover, the Armenian president said that Armenia considers Nagorno Karabakh together and the occupied territories as a part of Armenia. So what can we talk about now?" Musabekov wondered.

In this regard, the analyst is skeptical about the chances of organizing a meeting between the two presidents. "Only when Armenia takes a reasonable position can there be any sense in a meeting of the presidents. To do this, Armenia should get a clear signal, at the level of heads of state of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs, that it's time to carry out the UN Security Council decisions and consider the withdrawal of Armenian armed forces. It is hard to believe in a new meeting without this," Rasim Musabekov noted.

The Director of the Center for Regional Studies, political scientist Richard Kirakosyan, in his turn, interprets the use of Azerbaijani artillery in the shootings as evidence of its intention to resume active military operations in Nagorno-Karabakh. "The recent clashes are not caused by military logic or combat missions, but directly connected with the diplomatic calendar. Azerbaijan has the intention of influencing the meeting between the Foreign Ministers of Azerbaijan and Armenia and the preparation of a meeting between the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan," the expert believes.

Kirakosyan also saw the willingness of Baku to recall the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in the latest developments. "Recent Russian operations in Syria may have been interpreted in Baku as something that Russia is now distracted by from the events taking place in Nagorno-Karabakh. As we have seen, there weren't any concerns about it at the last CSTO summit, unfortunately. As a result, diplomacy provoked military operations," the analyst noted.

"Based on previous experience, including previous instances of growing tensions over the past few years, we expect that the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan will meet in October or November. In addition, we can count on a new round of Russian mediation. For example, President Putin may try to resolve the situation by organizing another additional meeting between the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan," he explained.