1/ If you haven’t been watching the situation in the so-called #Lachin Corridor, the only road connecting Armenia and #Karabakh, you should now. The Armenian-Azerbaijani situation may be sliding slowly back into conflict. A short thread.
2/ Self-declared Azerbaijani environmentalists evidently sent there by the government in Baku (Azerbaijan’s version of “Little Green Men”?) have been blocking the Lachin road and therefore access in and out for local Armenians. eurasianet.org/azerbaijanis-a…
3/ Azerbaijan has legitimate concerns about alleged new mines being laid around the corridor. But as this expert hints Azerbaijan's agenda is much bigger than this: “the establishment of Baku’s sovereign rights over the entire territory of Karabakh.” jam-news.net/azerbaijan-is-…
4/ This year’s EU-brokered talks have made progress. Both sides have talked about signing a peace treaty. But there’s still no agreement on the future of the Karabakh Armenians. And Azerbaijan, now the dominant side, has shown it will use force to try and get concessions.
5/ EU officials I speak to are worried. They are trying to keep the talks going. As this statement shows:
6/ Trouble is, the main burden of interpreting/enforcing the Nov 2020 agreement that ended the 44-day war, still falls on Russia -- a job it’s not performed well, let's say... Its hands are tied in Ukraine, it has little trust in Arm. or Az., and zero trust internationally.
7/ In Karabakh itself the Russian PKF has no agreed mandate or rules of engagement. It's been somewhat depleted thanks to Ukraine. But it’s also regarded by NK Armenians as their main protector—thereby driving more distrust in Baku.
8/ Pres. Aliyev does, I believe, want a peace agreement, not a new war, but it looks as though he also wants concessions which the Armenian side says it cannot meet. A big risk that we get serious new outbreak of violence by default.
• • •
Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to
force a refresh
1 Credit to @Kamal_Makili for setting out the case for Aaland Islands style autonomy for the Karabakh Armenians very eloquently here. commonspace.eu/node/11445
2 As Kamal himself points out, neither Baku nor Stepanakert is interested in discussing this at the moment. But he makes some important points, including about how international guarantees underpin the Aaland Islands model.
3 In my recent (not so much noticed) article for Analyticon I also mention the three big Helsinki Final Act principles of territorial integrity, self-determination and non-use of force as 3 conceptual pillars of a peace process. theanalyticon.com/en/may-2022-en…
Here is a piece commissioned by the Armenian online analytical journal Analyticon on the new EU mediated ARM-AZ talks theanalyticon.com/en/may-2022-en…
Three questions. The role of Russia? What now for the Minsk Group. (It’s frozen but not entirely dead). And what about the #Karabakh Armenians? Territorial independence is off the table but, as I’ve said for many years, the question of their security is paramount.
In a new statement Charles Michel’s spokesperson clarified some details and also stresses the importance of public diplomacy and “rights and security” consilium.europa.eu/en/press/press…
1 A great despatch by @MarcChampion1 from Bessarabia in SW Ukraine. It’s important for its long Black Sea coast, as a supply route to the EU, more than ever now as Odessa is blockaded. Which is why the Russians destroyed the Zatoka bridge. bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
2 It’s also Ukraine's most multi-ethnic region: a legacy of being part of the Ottoman Empire, Russian Empire, Romania, the USSR, now Ukraine. A real mosaic of nationalities. And Russian is the lingua franca.
3 I loved visiting Bessarabia in 2018, wrote this report with @BalazsJarabik. Fair to say that a) people felt alienated from Kyiv and central government b) there was no great love for Moscow either c) most complaints were economic, esp. about roads carnegieeurope.eu/2018/05/24/bes…
1 A new chilling imperialist article in the Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Pravda openly threatens Moldova, Georgia and the Baltic States. A summary. kp.ru/daily/27385/45…
2 As ever we can't know if it was written in coordination with Russia’s elite or if the eager pupil is merely trying to please the teacher. It certainly normalizes the idea that Russia has the right to use force against neighbours who make a different geopolitical choice.
3 The Ukraine “events” are, we're told, “a turning point in the contemporary history of post-Soviet politics and a decisive step by Russia towards the complete re-formatting of the geopolitical situation in the territory of the former USSR.”
Different signals on the future of #Transnistria/#Transdniestria#Moldova as the Ukraine war continues. Russia military commander Rustam Minnekayev, quoted in today’s Kommersant, says Russia's war aim is to establish total control over south of Ukraine. kommersant.ru/doc/5318738
That means, establishing a land bridge to Crimea, crippling Ukraine's economy--and also linking up, he says, to Transdniestria “where facts are recorded of the oppression of the Russian-language population” (By whom? we might ask.)
The population of Trandniestria itself do not seem to have got the memo. A report here three days ago that increasing numbers of Transdniestrians are applying for Moldovan citizenship and the total number is now at 338,000 newsmaker.md/rus/novosti/v-…
Parallels and differences in Ukraine with Russia’s first war in #Chechnya in 1994. My piece for @WSJ from Friday. A swift "special operation" failed, there was no Plan B. So Moscow resorted to mass bombardment, Russians in Grozny bore the brunt of it. wsj.com/articles/chech…
The brutality of the Russian army against Chechens rallied resistance, even from opponents of Jokhar Dudayev.
Both then and now I see what I'd call a “false memory” of World War II, that forgets the human cost and assumes that total warfare is a legitimate route to victory...
My piece came out before the Bucha massacre was revealed. If I were to write it today I would have talked more about impunity, about atrocities in Samashki and Novye Aldi that were never properly investigated.