Neither war nor peace

From time to time, when the situation in the mountainous Karabakh region gets tense, Russia’s leadership holds a trilateral summit on Russian territory. The same occasion took place this year. The international community accepts Russian involvement in defusing the dangerous situation in the region. For its part, Russia is maintaining its domination in the region. Moscow always pursues one goal-to prove to the world that the South Caucasus is a sphere of Russian interests and influence. In reality, the Kremlin does not want peace in the region, as it greatly benefits from the confrontations.

The meeting of Russian, Azerbaijani and Armenian Presidents on August 10 was the eleventh. The bloody conflict that started in 1988 was frozen in 1994. By then, Armenia managed to take a considerable portion of Azeri territory. Prior to the events, the UN received a resolution, which supported Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity. In March 1994, a special entity, the Minsk Group, was established by the OSCE. It was designed to bring some outcomes to the situation. However, neither the UN resolution, nor the Minsk Group provided any positives.

There were several attempts of theses organizations to suggest various models for regulating the conflict. However, it is not easy to draft a document that meets the interests of both sides.

During the last several years, under the initiative of Russian President Putin, several trilateral meetings have been held in Moscow, Petersburg, Sochi and other locales. But, none of those meetings yielded any viable results.

All the sides highlight the idea of a peaceful ending to the conflict. However, no results have been achieved thus far. It is not known whether Putin has suggested any new initiative or not. One thing is for sure, Russia is providing weapons to both sides. Owing to the threat from Azerbaijan, Yerevan clings to Moscow, when the latter enjoys its beloved formula- “neither war nor peace.”