The year 2021 passed into the pages of Armenian history with all its upheavals.
In September of the previous year, Armenia found itself face to face with Azerbaijan’s bloodthirsty policy. This was certainly not the first time that Azerbaijan resorted to armed actions against Armenia and Artsakh. Over the past 30 years, exchanges of fire had taken place on several occasions, which would subside after a few hours or days.
This time, however, the situation was completely different. Azerbaijan had at its side NATO member Turkey with all its military capabilities, Pakistan—which to this day does not recognise Armenia as a state—and Syrian mercenaries who had arrived from Turkey via Georgia. Azerbaijan had come armed with the most modern weapons, sold by Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Turkey, Israel and others.
For 44 days, Azerbaijan, by continuously bombing mostly non-military targets in the territory of Artsakh, finally reached the vicinity of Stepanakert. Only at that moment did Russia suddenly finally decide to intervene, sending its peacekeeping forces and imposing a fragile ceasefire.
And so, the authorities of Armenia greeted the year 2021 with great disappointments. The prime minister, who three years earlier had enjoyed wide popularity, found himself in a difficult situation where he was being accused from all sides as a traitor. It was a convenient opportunity for the old guard to return and continue its failed policies and inept diplomacy of the previous thirty years.
Despite the decisive election results in his favour, several opposition forces decided to appeal to the Constitutional Court to call into question the results of the snap elections. It was quite encouraging to witness how the sessions were held with complete discipline and in a civilised atmosphere.
However, this situation did not last long, especially when the National Assembly began its sessions. As they say, when a new grouping emerges, it generally passes through four stages: the forming stage, the storming stage, the norming stage and the performing stage. And so, before long, within the National Assembly we witnessed street-level offensive insults, the throwing of bottles, boxing, wrestling and other kinds of “sports disciplines.”
And all this was taking place while Azerbaijan continued to cut through new Armenian territories along Syunik and Gegharkunik. As a result, when Armenia turned for help to the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), that organisation at the time stated that the escalation of the situation on Armenia’s southern border and the incursion of Azerbaijani forces within Armenia’s state borders did not fall under the provisions of the CSTO charter. Instead, it called on both sides to refrain from escalating the situation. And so, the Azerbaijani provocations remained unpunished and continue to this day, causing the needless martyrdom of young Armenian soldiers of the rising generation.
However, suddenly at the beginning of this year, when internal protests erupted in Kazakhstan on the part of its rebellious population, the Kazakh president turned to the CSTO for help to confront the tense situation. And the same organisation, without hesitation, sent a “peacekeeping” army within two days. Armenia, which currently holds the presidency of this organisation, had no other alternative but to comply with this request, which came from a country whose president had at the time sent heartfelt congratulations to Azerbaijan on the occasion of its victory in Artsakh.
Let us imagine for a moment what the outcome would have been if Serzh Sargsyan had also turned to the CSTO in 2018 to confront Nikol Pashinyan’s “velvet” revolution. But here is precisely where Armenia differs from its “allies” and feels isolated among the remaining autocratic and pro-Turkish members of the CSTO family.
These successive crises seem to be gradually consigning to oblivion the rights of the people of Artsakh to national self-determination.
In 1994, a ceasefire was signed by the representatives of Armenia, Azerbaijan and Artsakh, thereby granting a certain recognition to the self-proclaimed republic of Artsakh. Unfortunately, however, the authorities of Armenia, especially during those twenty years when they enjoyed the leadership of two presidents of Artsakh origin, instead of advancing the approach that the representatives of the people of Artsakh should sit at the negotiating table and present their demands for national self-determination to the Azerbaijani authorities, themselves sat at the negotiating table, even keeping the representatives of the Republic of Artsakh out of the room.
And now, finally, with the encouragement of the West, attempts are again being made to establish diplomatic relations between Armenia and Turkey. A similar ill-fated attempt was made in 2009, according to which Armenia was to renounce once and for all any territorial claims, and Turkey was to be relieved of any obligation to recognise the Armenian Genocide.
Turkey has now already prepared two additional conditions: Armenia must recognise the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan’s lands, including Artsakh, and must provide a corridor so that Azerbaijan can establish a land connection with Nakhichevan.
On the other hand, the authorities of the Third Republic of Armenia consistently advance the well-intentioned idea that negotiations should proceed without any preconditions. However, Armenia has a legal basis to demand Kars, Ardahan and Surmalu, which the leadership of the First Republic of Armenia ceded to Turkey under the 1918 Treaty of Batum, especially Surmalu, which the Turks had not managed to occupy. Armenia also has a legal basis to pursue the annulment of the 1921 Russian-Turkish treaty detrimental to Armenians, which determined the borders between Armenia and Turkey, as well as the status of Nakhichevan, when the Armenian delegation was excluded from the negotiations as a result of the February Uprising.
Today, the USA, Russia and France have all recognised the Armenian Genocide. Russia, by recognising the Armenian Genocide, has also recognised the existence of Western Armenia. The presidents of Russia and France were in Yerevan for the commemorations of the 100th anniversary of the Genocide. This is perhaps the most opportune moment to exert pressure on Turkey so that it too recognises the Armenian Genocide and guarantees the return of at least a part of the occupied lands of Western Armenia to the Republic of Armenia.
And the diaspora, especially the influential Armenian communities of the USA, Russia and France, have a great role to play in making a practical contribution and coordinating these efforts for the sake of the salvation and survival of our homeland.
Areg Yapujian
Sydney, Australia
