Oleg Kusov, exclusively to VK
The Nagorno-Karabakh war is growing
Two resolutions, an intergovernmental treaty, numerous trips to the Caucasus by representatives of international organizations – on the one hand. Charges and destruction of cities, capturing the base area – on the other hand. In July 1993 in the Caucasus the military appeared to be more bloodthirsty than the politicians, while the hawks were craftier than the pigeons, which wasn’t something new.
Battles took place outside Nagorno-Karabakh. Two resolutions of international organizations couldn’t stop the attack by the Armenian Armed Forces. The first was adopted on July 3rd in Istanbul at the summit of the Organization of Economic Cooperation. The OEC was founded in 1985 by Turkey, Iran and Pakistan for development of economic ties. After 1991 Azerbaijan and all the countries of Central Asia joined it. Even though the OEC mostly dealt with economic affairs, the summit judged it to be Armenian aggression against Azerbaijan.
A second resolution was adopted in late July by the Security Council of the UN. But it was preceded by numerous military events in the zone of the military conflict.
On the 3rd of July the battle for the Azerbaijani town of Aghdam began. Two previous attacks by the Armenian armed groups – on July 12 and 15 – were resisted, as well as a third later. On July 5th the town appeared to be surrounded. On July 14th 6000 soldiers, an MI-24 helicopter squadron and about 60 tanks were sent to storm the town. Aghdam was defended by 6000 soldiers as well, and almost half of them were killed during the storming. It continued for 10 days, but on the night of July 24th Azerbaijani troops left the town. Aghdam’s siege lasted for 42 days. The Armenian side stated that the town had strategic importance, as Azerbaijani artillery bombed Stapanakert from it.
Aghdam’s fate is one of the most tragic pages of the Nagorno-Karabakh war. The regional center with 30,000 residents was completely destroyed and turned into a ghost town. Only a mosque remained in its center. In Soviet times Aghdam was well-known in the country due to production of cognac and wine there. Aghdam grapes and cheese were appreciated in Azerbaijan. According to some economists, the damage to Aghdam’s economy was more than $350 million. For 20 years the ruins of the town have been one of the most serious reproaches to the military enemies of our time, despite their civil or national belonging. Few journalists visit the ghost town and take photos of its ruins. The military patrol the local territory because visiting the lost town is forbidden.
On July 29th, five days after taking Aghdam, the Security Council of the UN adopted Resolution 853 and judged it had been the capture of all occupied regions of Azerbaijan. The resolution demanded “an immediate cease-fire and complete withdrawal of the occupying forces from the Aghdam region and all other recently-occupied regions of Azerbaijan.” The resolution confirmed the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Azerbaijan. Thus, July 29th marked 20 years of absolute ignoring of the UN document adopted by a solid vote at the 3259th session of the Security Council.
In late July telephone talks between representatives of Baku and Stepanakert took place. They agreed on peace for five days. These were conversations between the vice-premier of Azerbaijan Rasul Guliyev and the chairman of the State Defense Committee of NKR Robertn Kocharyan (later the second president of Armenia), as well as between the Azerbaijani military minister Safar Abiyev and the chairman of the Self-Defense Committee of NKR Serge Sargsyan (later the third president of Armenia).
On July 23rd the foreign political department was formed in the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic. The first republican foreign minister was Arkady Gukasyan – the advisor of the chairman of the State Defense Committee on political affairs. In four years Arkady Gukasyan was elected the president of the NKR.
Agreement on the eve of destruction
On the night before July 2, Abkhaz military units launched a plan called "July Offensive". Troopers from Gudauta numbering 300 landed in the village of Tamysh in the Ochamchire district of Abkhazia. Through the village the republic's primary route runs, through which the transfer and supply of Georgian troops still controlling Sukhumi were made. For a week, the Georgian forces in Sukhumi remained cut off from their rear. Simultaneously, with the landing in the southern part of the republic, the Abkhazian units activated on the north-west, in the direction of Sukhumi. Here they were able to take control of the village of Shroma (Guma) by the end of July 9. Thus, the Abkhaz units were in the upper Gumista from which there are about 9 miles to Sukhumi.
On July 2, Georgian leader Eduard Shevardnadze declared a general mobilization.
On the same day, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Georgia, Alexander Chikvaidze, said in Tbilisi to the representatives of the U.S., Germany, Turkey, Iran, China and the UN that the offensive operations of the Abkhaz militias are supported by the Russian army. The representative of the Russian President Boris Pastukhov, being in Sukhumi, denied the allegation. Eduard Shevardnadze was more delicate than his minister, stressing that the Russian side does not accept global participation in the conflict, but "provides the Abkhaz with weapons and prepares their military personnel."
On July 2, the United Nations Security Council considered a letter from the head of Georgia on the situation in Abkhazia and at the meeting expressed deep concern on the intensification of fighting in Sukhumi. The UN Security Council called on the parties to cease hostilities.
On the same day, the Supreme Soviet of Abkhazia appealed to the president of the Confederation of Peoples of the Caucasus and called for "immediate assistance by all means at your disposal."
On July 3, commander Shamil Basayev ordered the enforcement of a state of high alert in all Abkhazian units of the Confederation and a state of readiness of the first tier of reservists in all the republics of the Confederation of Peoples of the Caucasus.
On July 4, representatives of the creative and scientific intelligentsia of Russia and Abkhazia sent an appeal to Russian President Boris Yeltsin, the head of the Supreme Council Ruslan Khasbulatov and the prime minister Viktor Chernomyrdin, which emphasized that the support of Russia for "the demands of the population of Abkhazia on the withdrawal of Georgian troops could not only save the people from physical destruction but also strengthen the Russian Federation itself, and would also help to stabilize the tensions in the South of Russia and the North Caucasus."
On July 6, at talks held in Moscow between delegations from Tbilisi and Sukhumi, the topic of signing by the parties of the Ceasefire Agreement and the withdrawal of all armed forces from the territory of Abkhazia was discussed. The Georgian delegation agreed to sign the document but refused to accept the proposal of the Abkhazian delegation, which sought the signatures of Shevardnadze and Ardzinba.
On July 8, ambassadors of Russia, the U.S. and Germany and seven representatives of the United Nations arrived in Sukhumi. It became known that the Russian Minister Andrei Kozyrev called for closing the Russian-Abkhaz border on the River Psou. On the same day, the Supreme Soviet of Abkhazia adopted an appeal to the peoples of the North Caucasus, which said that Moscow was trying to "isolate us from each other."
On July 9, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution N849 on the situation in Abkhazia. The members of the Security Council asked "the Secretary-General to send his Special Representative to the region to assist in reaching an agreement on the implementation of the ceasefire and immediately initiate the necessary preparatory measures, including the establishment of contacts with Member States which can provide observers and send to the district planning groups associated with the direction of 50 military observers to Georgia immdiately after the cease-fire."
On the same day there was a tragedy in the village of Svan in Kamani - the mass murder of civilians. This tragedy became one of the darkest pages of the Georgian- Abkhazian conflict.
On July 13, War Minister Gia Karkarashvili reported that the Georgian military were able to destroy Abkhazian forces in the village of Tamysh, thereby unlocking the road in the direction of the capital.
Eduard Shevardnadze said in Brussels that "we would support any participation of NATO and the Security Council in a resolution of the conflict in Abkhazia." The call of the head of Georgia went without a practical response.
On July 14, the Russian president's special envoy to the conflict zone, Boris Pastukhov, met with Vladislav Ardzinba in Sochi, then went to the MPs to Gudauta and then to Tbilisi. Pastukhov discussed with the Georgian and Abkhaz authorities a plan to end the fighting. According to some reports, Shevardnadze agreed to start negotiations on the withdrawal of troops, but the head of the Abkhaz government (in exile) Tamaz Nadareyshvili categorically opposed this. On July 18 he was forced to resign, and instead Shevardnadze appointed his rival Zhiuli Shartava. He was intended to succeed Shevardnadze, but on September 27th 1993 he was killed in Gudauta when a Kabardian military formation captured the building of the Council of Ministers of Abkhazia in Sukhumi.
On July 19, a group of representatives of the UN arrived in Abkhazia, which explained to the parties the concept of the military observer mission and solved practical questions about its stay in the country.
On July 23, Georgian Prime Minister Tengiz Sigua told local journalists that Georgia does not preclude a rupture of diplomatic relations with Russia, and more than that, a Russian-Georgian war was also not excluded in the near future.
But at the same time, Shevardnadze made a statement that the conditions for the beginning of a conversation about peace had been formed. The experts were of the opinion that speaking of such "conditions" the Georgian leader means the successful offensive of the Abkhaz forces.
July 24, Shevardnadze said that Russia's role in the settlement increases.
On this day, the Georgian parliament considered the truce with the Abkhazians. The heated discussion turned into a fight. The meeting lasted nine hours. As a result, the parliament gave powers to Shevardnadze to sign agreements with the Government of Ardzinba. The head of Georgia, in turn, instructed its representatives in Abkhazia to sign a cease-fire in Abkhazia.
On July 26 the issue of peace was discussed by the Supreme Council of Abkhazia, and they have not avoided controversy. The Abkhaz military claimed that they could conquer Sukhumi in the coming days.
On July 27 the "Agreement on the cease-fire in Abkhazia and the mechanism for its enforcement" was signed in Sochi by Deputy Speaker of Abkhazia Jinjolia, Speaker of the Georgian Parliament Gaguadze and Russian Foreign Minister Kozyrev. According to the document, from 12 pm on July 28 the parties ceased fire, from July 29 the work time for the Georgian-Abkhaz-Russian monitoring groups begins, and by August 5 the formation of the Joint Commission for a settlement should be completed. Georgian troops, under the agreement, left Abkhazia, but local Georgians had to form a division of the interior troops, and the Abkhazian armed formations were united in a similar regiment.
In Tbilisi, the Sochi agreement was widely seen as a capitulation, stressing that the Georgian forces in Abkhazia are within their country and they should not be moved by the will of the representatives of other states.
On July 28, Loti Kobalia once again accused the government of betraying Shevardnadze and conquered the city of Senaki without a fight. He invited the disgraced Tengiz Kitovani to join a military alliance. The association did not work, but Tbilisi was still scared by the strengthening of Zviadists in western Georgia. Two days later, the official authorities reached an agreement with Loti Kobalia about getting his unit leaving Senaki. But the real control over much of Samegrelo was still kept by the representatives of Zviad Gamsakhurdia.
The Vainakh sell oil and agree on border
Johar Dudayev destroyed the opposition, which left Grozny and settled in the Upper Terek and Urus- Martan districts. But taking control of the situation in the rest of "Ichkeria" could not be managed. In July and August 1993 there were constant clashes between Chechen groups. The Kremlin did not intervene, but proceeded to apply economic pressure.
On July 16, Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Shakhrai prepared for President Boris Yeltsin an information letter, in which he offered to completely cut off oil supplies to Chechnya and instruct the Ministry of Security to control the flow of oil products from Chechnya. Despite the formal sovereignty, oil continued to be supplied to Chechnya from many Russian oil fields. In the words of the human rights activist and expert on the Caucasus Alexander Cherkasov, “in the course of 1992 from the republic 4,031.1 tons of diesel fuel, 1,631.5 thousand tons of gasoline, 125.5 tons of lighting kerosene and 36.6 thousand tons of diesel oil were exported. The main "recipients” of the exports were the Baltic states, Turkey and some other countries. At the same time, no machines, no food and no high-tech were supplied to Chechnya. Money was kept somewhere else."
The information letter by Sergei Shakhrai said: "Supply and processing of oil are used by the Dudayev regime to implement its domestic political purposes - purchase of significant quantities of weapons and arming their supporters, creating an appearance of free distribution of petroleum products to the population, paying for flour and artificial maintenance of lower prices for bread by oil supplies (the flour was mostly embezzled), bribery of a number of influential religious authorities, payments to mercenaries from the Baltic states and western Georgia, etc.; supply and processing of oil used by the Chechen leadership and foreign policy objectives... Having accumulated large foreign exchange funds, the Dudayev regime is turning the Republic into a staging post for drugs and weapons. In this process, voluntarily or under threat, more and more employees of the government of Russia are involved."
On July 17 the head of the interim administration in the territories of North Ossetia and Ingushetia, Victor Polianichko, ordered the creation of a "security zone" on the border between the two republics of a width from 2 to 8 km. According to the order, "in the zone, the action of units attached to the interim administration and village police departments within the boundaries of settlements is permitted. Illegal armed formations of the Republic of North Ossetia and the Ingush Republic in the area of security are strictly prohibited. "The order has been criticized by the Ingush public, who claimed that the head of the interim administration has actually allowed the North Ossetian forces to remain in the rest of the suburban area."
On July 23 the presidents of Chechnya and Ingushetia signed an agreement "On the principles of determining the boundaries of territories between the Chechen Republic of Ichkeria and the Republic of Ingushetia." The Chechen side has shown generosity and gave the Ingush most of the Sunzha district. The first article of the agreement stated: "The High Contracting Parties undertake not to carry out territorial demarcation and not to set the state border between the Republic of Chechnya and Ingushetian Republic without the consent of the contracting parties."
In late July the Russian government offered the Chechen Republic membership in the Federation with a special status, with powers higher than that of Tatarstan. The parliament rejected the proposal.
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Remembering the events of the hot summer of 1993, one wonders how easily the politicians and the military went to the destruction of cities, businesses, villages, not to mention mass murder. The example of Aghdam alone is horrific - a rich economic center is razed to the ground, homes and businesses are pilfered and sold, a large number of people are killed, refugees flooded other parts of the country. How many years do we need to restore what was lost? But so far in the territories formed as a result of modern Caucasian wars there is no intensive rehabilitation process. Active creation is underway in those republics whose land was torn away.
