When Serzh Sargsyan announced about his “football initiative” to help the relations between Armenia and Turkey during his visit to Moscow several months ago, the first imagination was that the new government of Armenia, which had not clarified its relations with the new Russian government yet, was initiating some demarche. Such opinions seemed to be logical because the US have always tried to support our two countries to develop relations but Russia has always been trying to deprive us from any political and geopolitical alternatives. It is becoming more logical in consideration of the fact that this country is a NATO member. In the begging there were few people who thought that this initiative might be connected with the recent close economic relations between Russia and Turkey. In such conditions the West actively encouraged the government of Armenia for their initiative but the Russian media was keeping diplomatic silence. However soon in July the political leaders and groups of Armenia had to realize that definitely this decision had been agreed with the government of Russia (in some cases it might have been instructed by Moscow too) and was conditioned by the recent geopolitical changes in the region, where Armenia and especially Turkey had been given new important roles in the ongoing processes. It is hard to imagine whether Serzh Sargsyan could predict the geopolitical changes in the beginning of August when he was thinking about the mentioned intitiative in mid June. However the transparent hints of some Western experts and specialists say that the developments in Georgia had been mostly predictable in the Kremlin. Specifically it is worth mentioning that some western media outlets allege that there is a confidential agreement between the US and Russia, which is entitled “Membership of Georgia in NATO against independence of South Ossetia”. Establishing new status-quo in the region through a short-term and blitz war was an integral part of this project. Besides that this short-term war and the “nationalistic pathos” would be helpful both for the pre-election US and the new administration of Russia. Certainly the “excentric” president of Georgia was given a specific role in implementing this project. Of course it is natural that Russia gave an important role to its only strategic partner in the region, Armenia (definitely only the terms were not clarified). However the latter has always been dependent from Georgia due to the fact that it doesn’t have communication alternatives and in order to escape from possible risks it could maneuver between Russia and its neighbor Georgia (it has been successful till the recent times). From this point of view the vision of opening the Turkish-Armenia border fits with the political strategy of Russia at this point. It is not surprising that Russia, in consideration of the interests of the West to normalize the Armenian-Turkish relations, decided to make a risky step and let the authorities of Armenia use the alternative communication opportunities. As a response it was expected that their strategic partner would have an active part in the possible conflict. According to some sources of information from Moscow, this scenario was discussed between the presidents of Armenia and Russia during their official meeting in June, after which Serzh Sargsyan started the implementation of this project with the meeting with the famous Armenians of Moscow and Gul’s invitation to watch the football match. It is not excluded that the government of Armenia (maybe the Russian government as well) did not suppose that the opportunity of having a new status-quo in the region would come so fast due to the lack of restraint on part of Sahakashvili. Definitely Armenia would agree to become an active participant of Russia’s game in the region and hoped to have a longer time for diversifying its communication with the world. However both the terms of processes and methods of realizing interests of the participants were not the same as the Armenian government expected they be. The most dangerous thing for the Armenian government is the fact that the complementary foreign policy of Armenia cannot continue in the same way any more after the Russian-Georgian, and from the global point of view Russian-American political, diplomatic, economic and even military conflict. The strategic partner of Armenia started showing that it was time for Armenia to express its stance and give the debts back. It seems more logical also in consideration of the fact how many efforts the Russian government makes to bring the former and incumbent authorities of Armenia to the government. During the entire period of the war the authorities of Armenia were keeping silence and neutrality, which, according to the estimations of some Russian media companies has been considered in Russia as an attempt to escape from responsibilities. Of course it would be a mistake to think that it was a coincidence that the Ukrainian saboteurs appeared in our region and explode the only railway connecting Armenia with the external world. By the way, there are rumors that the Moscow generals of the Russian army still hope that the blockade of Armenia may make Armenia become interested in Javakhk, but Armenia continued sending only condolences to the conflicting parties. From this point of view it was expected that Serzh Сargsyan’s visit to Sochi would change something because it was logical that instead of demanding to recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia the Russian president would press on him to be active in the conflict. Based on the processes after those negotiations we may assume that the parties have agreed upon the minimal project. It is not by chance that the pro-government media of Armenia started circulating the idea of necessity of granting sovereignty to Javakhk in the “Federation of Georgia”. In consideration of the fact that the maximum effect were such publications and the rally launched by the ARF, Russia might not have been satisfied with these actions since it is not supported by the international community either. In fact the policy of Armenia, which is a partner of Russia, did not significantly differ from the policy of Azerbaijan, which is not considered Russia’s strategic partner. Furthermore, Russia was shocked by Serzh Sargsyan’s announcement in the presence of Armenian diplomats stating that Armenia will not recognize the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. In fact it included two “sharp” messages addressed to Russia. With this announcement saying that Armenia cannot recognize the independence of two new South Caucasian states with the same reason as it did not recognize the independence of Kosovo, Armenia wants to say that after recognizing those states and implementing complementary foreign policy Armenia will have to recognize Kosovo as well. This is the first important message. Also, by saying that Armenia cannot recognize the independence of other states until Armenia recognizes the independence of Karabakh it wants to make them understand that they should recognize Karabakh’s independence as well. One day later, during the CIS collective Security organization meeting the Russian FM Sergey Lavrov said that there is no similarity between the conflicts of Kosovo, Ossetia, Abkhazia and Karabakh. By the way, Azerbaijan accepted this gesture with understanding because, as the Russian media reports, Azerbaijan clearly oriented in the new geopolitical situation and openly failed Chaney’s visit to Azerbaijan, even some people appeared who said that they were suspicious that the Nabucco project to build a gas pipeline which does not cross the territory of Russia would be implemented. It is worth mentioning that after the US vice-president’s visit to Baku Dmitri Medvedev called the Azeri president, and according to sources of information from Azerbaijan the conversation between the two presidents was rather constructive. In the framework of close relations between Russia and Azerbaijan it is important to pay attention to media publications writing that on September 5 during the CIS presidents’ summit Armenia tried to fail the critical document concerning South Ossetia and Abkhazia and change it to the extent of excluding any critical points targeted at Georgia in it. As a result of that a document was adopted, which hardly may satisfy Russia because there is no provision in it statibng that the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia should be recognized. However, there is a thesis in this document which terminates that Georgia is an aggressor, thus hardly this provision will be ignored by Georgia. Definitely the Georgian government will not miss any6 opportunity to remind Armenia of this document. As for the Russian government, it may not be by chance that in the recent period there are rumors about bringing Kocharyan back to power because some group of influential top officials in Russia are highly interested in such scenario.
