Armenia returns to busy Turkish agenda

Turkey will come under pressure to normalize its relationship with neighboring Armenia, another component of the zero-problems policy of the re-elected government as hopes are running high over a progress at the June 25 meeting of the Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders mediated by Russia, Hurriyet reports.

The leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan will meet next Saturday in Kazan in Russia at a meeting brokered by Russian President Dimitri Medvedev, one of the mediators of the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh, an Azeri territory occupied by Yerevan. The speculation reveals the two sides are close to a framework agreement, which will ultimately lead to a breakthrough over the long-running dispute.

Initial signals of optimism came from Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Memmedyarov who said last week Armenia began to act more flexibly. Turkey, a party sided with Azerbaijan and closed its border with Yerevan in 1993 in solidarity with Baku, is not involved in the Minsk process leading negotiations between the two foes but says it is not very optimist.

“There has been stagnation over the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute. We are not very much hopeful but I hope progress will be made,” a senior Turkish Foreign Ministry diplomat told the Hürriyet Daily News.

Concentrated on a heated election campaign at home and surrounded by unrest in its regional neighborhood in the Middle East and North Africa, Turkey could not set aside extra time and energy for the Caucasus and as long as the uprisings especially in neighboring Syria continue, Ankara appears to fall short of channelizing into normalizing Armenia ties. The Foreign Ministry diplomat already confessed: “Right now regional issues are a priority for us.”