The president of the Republic of Nagorno-Karabagh Arkadi Ghukassian has announced that Karabagh can take part in the conflict negotiations only if Armenia refuses to negotiate with Azerbaijan.
“When Azerbaijan only negotiaties with Armenia, I consider that propaganda.”
This announcement proves that the Armenian and Karabagh authorities tend to disagree on some issues concerning the Karabagh conflict settlement. Is that really so? There was a time when the Armenian authorities had come up with a way for preventing such disagreements: “Armenia will accept any conflict settlement proposal which will also be accepted by Karabagh”. This means that Armenia will never sign under something which Karabagh is not in favor of. This also means that, in reality, Azerbaijan (even though it is non-official) would be able to negotiatie with Karabagh. Later on Armenia went along with two-way negotiations and supposedly Karabagh’s orientation was going to be taken into consideration. Today, it turns out that things are not what they seem.
In reality, can there be any disagreements between Armenia and Karabagh? There are two viewpoints to this. According to the first viewpoint, the unsettled conflict and the wartime status of Azerbaijan move Armenia out of processes going on in the region; meanwhile, if Armenia were to make some compromises (meaning, if it were to formally allow Karabagh be a part of Azerbaijan), then there would no longer be a blockade, economy would develop, etc. In other words, Karabagh is the one holding Armenia back from developing.
According to the second viewpoint, it is impossible to have Karabagh form a part of Azerbaijan and hand over the territories tying Armenia with Karabagh because that will lead to the emigration of Armenians from Karabagh. As a matter of fact, the people that agree with this viewpoint claim that making land compromises does not end anything because even if Azerbaijan gets some lands, there will never be peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Azerbaijan will demand Zangezur from Armenia and a new conflict will start.
To make a long story short, there can’t be any disagreements between Armenia and Karabagh because to lose Karabagh means to be get involved in a conflict, restart a war and finally, lose Armenia. Both Karabagh and Armenia understand this. The only thing that Karabagh and Armenia can debate on is strategies. That is why president of Karabagh Arkadi Ghukassian claims that leaving Karabagh out of the negotiations is a mishap in politics.
How can we correct that error? It is not too realistic to hope that sooner or later Armenia will refuse to lead negotiations with Azerbaijan and Azerbaijan, in its turn, will immediately start the negotiations with Karabagh. On the contrary, Azerbaijan will do everything it can to raise the issue around the world and prove that Armenia is an aggressor. In other words, it will continue the propaganda and will get more results. So, Armenia doesn’t have the right to stop the negotiations. Armenia shouldn’t be the one pressuring Azerbaijan, but rather the OSCE Minsk Group. The Minsk Group must be the one to allow Karabagh to participate in the negotiation process, if of course, they really want to establish peace and not manipulate Armenia and Azerbaijan through the means of negotiations.