Thursday, August 4 2016 04:08

 

 

What could you say about the reasons of the internal instability in Armenia?  

 

First and foremost, the reasons of instability in Armenia are the ill-being and poverty the authorities cannot remove. Many people think that the authorities fail to exert enough efforts to resolve the economic problems in Armenia. This sparks discontent, which seeks to be expressed politically. In addition, some peculiarities of Armenian nationalism are still creating and will keep creating such situations. The landmark of the national feelings and nationalism - I use this word in the Anglo-Saxon tradition, i.e. in a non-evaluative way - is the nation as it is, rather than the national statehood. And the concept of nation includes not only the Republic of Armenia, but also Karabakh, Diaspora, memories of erstwhile lost territories, glorification of battle groups of various periods. If you will, the symbolic capital of nationalism does not belong to the state, but it is scattered among various objects and actors. From the viewpoint of the Russian tradition, where the state is the nation, it is a paradox that a vast part of the Armenian society considers the armed group that took hostages and demanded a power shift in the country to be advocates of the national idea, not terrorists or rebels that attacked the national sovereignty. Moreover, they are perceived as political leaders, who instinctively grasp the "will of the nation" and put that will into practice without sparing themselves and others. Generally, nationalism is the ideological basis of a relevant national state. But the situation is different in Armenia: the nationalists rebel against their own state.

 

Do you think the current Transcaucasus vector of Moscow meets the nowadays reality. Would you assess Russia’s current policy with respect to Armenia and Azerbaijan in the context of the Karabakh conflict settlement?  

 

As a rule, the Transcaucasia is on the fringes of the Russian foreign political agenda. However, this does not mean that Russia is indifferent to the region. This reflects the reality that the ongoing processes in the Russian-US or Russian-German relations, as well as the developments in Syria or in Ukraine matter to Russia more than the Transcaucasia does, except for the cases when the region experiences grave crises that need the Russian political leadership's interference, the way it happened in early April. The Russian foreign policy in the Transcaucasia is reasonable, retrained and consistent to the extent possible. When the region is of no big priority, the tasks of that policy are conservative - to prevent new wars; to stop the wars if they break out; to prevent the region's countries from involving in the military blocs, which do not include Russia; to avoid deployment of the third countries' military infrastructure in the Transcaucasia; as well as to contribute to the settlement of the conflicts to the extent the conflicting parties are prepared for that. It is easy to see that Russia successfully copes with these tasks. Russia has always sought to retain the status of a mediator in the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan. In April, Moscow was actively encouraged to take the stand of either of the conflicting parties, but Moscow will never do that and will always strive to remain unbiased.    

 

Moscow’s rather ambiguous role in suspending the armed hostilities in April, when the parties were firing at each other mostly with the Russian arms acquired over the past two decades has significantly strengthened the Kremlin’s influence on both Armenian and Azerbaijani leaders. At the same time, in the conflicting societies the affection for Russia has considerably decreased. How much do you think Russia’s policy meets the interests of long-term retention of the Russian presence in the Transcaucasia given the recent examples of Georgia and Ukraine?

 

I would like to receive weightier arguments that the two societies’ affection for Russia has diminished after Russia stopped the war. In addition, affection is a rather unstable thing if you judge by the publicists’ texts. It is impossible to build the foreign policy on what newspaper columnists are writing in Yerevan and Baku. We prefer basing it on more serious things. I take quite a different view of what has happened in Ukraine and Georgia. In fact, Russia was working with broad public strata of Ukraine. The political influence of the forces seeking to cooperate with Russia was so big in Ukraine that our western partners had to organize a takeover and unleash a civil war to remove these forces from the political arena. The West simply could not win in Ukraine in a democratic way. The friendly forces will by all means return to Ukrainian politics and will hold their worthy place in Kiev. As regards Georgia, let’s recall at least the circumstances of Eduard Shevarnadze’s resignation and the role of Russia in the power shift in Adjara in May 2004. Moscow was sincerely looking for ways of cooperation with Saakashvili. The latter himself pushed off the hand offered to him and led his country to the disaster in 2008.

 

What geopolitical factors play the predetermining role in defining the vectors and content of the Russian foreign policy in the Caucasus and in the post-Soviet space? What is the main threat to existence of Russia and its interests in the CIS space?

 

I have already mentioned the tasks of the Russian foreign policy in the Transcaucasia. These are long-term tasks and they will determine the nature of the Russian policy for many years. I do not think the post-Soviet space has anything that threatens the existence of Russia. But there are certainly threats to Russia’s security and interests. First of all, it is the threat of a possible chaos in one or several post-Soviet states and the threat of emergence of radical groups like ISIS. Another threat is possible resumption of armed hostilities in the conflict zones. One more threat is the emergence of a military infrastructure or third countries’ security guarantees in the regions that are sensitive for Russia. 

 

What do you think should become the priority in determining the Russian policy and stand on the Karabakh conflict settlement? Where is the red line of Russia’s opportunities and preferences in resolving this conflict?   

 

The red line is to prevent a new war. The important thing is that the two societies should start the process of reconciliation and both the political classes and voters of Armenia and Azerbaijan should realize the need and the good of mutual concessions for the sake of peace and the value of that very peace.