Radar Armenia’s interlocutor is Shahan Gantaharyan, an international scholar.
– RA Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan referred to the deployment of CSTO peacekeepers on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and noted that Russia and Armenia are ready for CSTO observers to be deployed. Finally, will CSTO send a mission to Armenia?
– The deployment of peacekeepers can have a deterrent role. And, of course, there is a question of a bilateral agreement, which is done declaratively. The problem is the deployment of CSTO troops. Azerbaijan invaded the territory of Armenia. The process should be conditioned by the return of the Azerbaijani forces to the exit points. After that, peacekeepers should be deployed between the Armenian and Azerbaijani territories. Uncertainties are interrelated because this process is directly related to the differentiation and boundary processes, and it still needs to be determined on which maps the works will proceed. The Azerbaijani invasion and the task of deploying the CSTO troops are related to differentiation and delimitation. And border demarcation is the third point of the peace treaty proposed by Azerbaijan.
– How effective will be the simultaneous presence of EU and CSTO missions on the borders of Armenia?
– When there is geopolitical competition between guarantors and mediators in the region, it is challenging to assume that EU and CSTO missions will complement each other. There will be competition, leading to some upheavals, not necessarily in a warlike way. There will be counterbalancing missions, the goal of not peace but maintaining or conquering a sphere of influence.
– The General Secretary of the CSTO also stated that no one would impose this or that solution on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict with Azerbaijan on the Armenian allies. What does this mean?
– This implies keeping the steering wheel of the process to carry out a mediation mission. It is a classic rule of maintaining an equal distance, applied mainly to be acceptable to the parties. Unilateralism will violate the status of mediator or peacekeeper.
– According to the Secretary General of the CSTO, the situation in the South Caucasus remains no less complicated and explosive, “Risks related to Nagorno-Karabakh and the Armenian-Azerbaijani border are still relevant today.” What do these statements indicate? What are your expectations?
– There is particular haste in implementing the CSTO mission and deploying troops on the Azerbaijan-Armenia border. Talking about the high probability of war aims to speed up the agreement on the deployment of the peacekeeping mission, and not only that. They want to say that with CSTO peacekeeping and Russian mediation, the peace agreement should be speeded up.
– Securing the cessation of hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan, especially in Nagorno-Karabakh, is very important to Secretary of State Blinken. What messages does this statement convey, and to whom?
– Washington wants to show that they are involved in establishing peace in the region and that it is not Moscow’s monopoly. Indirectly they wish to say that Moscow could be more successful in carrying out a peacekeeping mission in Artsakh. Artsakh remains under siege, and Baku continues to fire. In this respect, Baku’s military policy hits Moscow’s interests and gives a card to the collective West.
