Category: Eastern Europe

  • Georgia’s conflict and Iran and Turkey

    Georgia’s conflict and Iran and Turkey

    Georgia’s conflict and Iran and Turkey
    By Rayyan al-Shawaf
    Commentary by
    Tuesday, September 09, 2008

    Although the Russo-Georgian military clash is over, its ramifications will be felt for a long time, especially as the political crisis between the two countries remains unresolved. In the Middle East, two major countries, Turkey and Iran, have been directly affected by the recent events. While Turkey stands to lose should Russia and Georgia fail to resolve their differences, Iran stands to win.

    An embattled Russia cornered by the West would never forgive NATO member Turkey; as a result, Russian-Turkish relations would plummet and Russia might even stop providing Turkey with natural gas. In casting about for allies, Russia would find a similarly isolated Iran to be amenable to giving the two countries’ ties a strategic dimension, but only in return for political and economic concessions. Thus, the Russo-Georgian crisis may ironically change the balance of power in the Middle East.

    Both Russia and Iran have become increasingly alarmed with the West’s attempts to bypass them in the quest for oil. Moscow wanted the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline, the world’s second longest, to pass through Russia. That way, Russia would not only benefit financially, but also be able to exert some control over the supply of oil to the West, much as it does with the longest pipeline in the world, the Druzhba, which flows from southeast Russia to Europe. During its invasion of Georgia, Russia pointedly demonstrated that it can threaten the BTC pipeline, and that, as Russian President Dmitry Medvedev recently put it, “Russia is a nation to be reckoned with.”

    Meanwhile, Iran, most of whose oil flows to Asia, has long sought to lay oil pipelines to the West, a desire more often than not frustrated by Western sanctions. By supporting Russia in its current confrontation with the West, Tehran may have secured a future economic and political payoff. This would be especially true should Iran have extracted from Russia a commitment to devise a common oil strategy vis-a-vis the West.

    However, even without this possibility, there are several indicators of the benefits that may accrue to Iran as a result of its pro-Russian policy. For example, Iranian (and Syrian) requests for a sophisticated missile defense system are being taken seriously in Moscow, much to the chagrin of the United States and Israel. When one remembers that Iran’s Bushehr nuclear plant – built with Russian support – is slated to begin operation in 2009, it becomes apparent that Iran may be on the verge of radically enhancing its regional and international position.

    Even as Iran makes a bid for regional power status, Turkey has almost by accident emerged as the country that could hold the key to solving the Russo-Georgian crisis. Indeed, Turkey is exceptionally well-positioned to be mediator, a role it is already playing with some success between Syria and Israel, and to a lesser extent between Iran and the West. Russia is Turkey’s biggest trading partner, and Turkey is dependant on Russian natural gas. At the same time, Turkey maintains strong economic and military ties with Georgia, which aspires to join NATO, of which Turkey is a strategic member. Turkey cannot afford to allow its relations with Russia to deteriorate – they have already been strained by the passage of American ships through the Bosphorus on their way to the Georgian port of Batumi – but neither can it shun the West’s call for supporting Georgia. As a result, mediating the current conflict is not only a role that could propel Turkey into the limelight as a major regional player, but also a necessity insofar as Turkish politico-economic imperatives are concerned.

    If Turkey meets the challenge, there may even be added benefits. Turkish-Armenian relations could thaw, which would be of great significance to the oil and natural gas industry. The most direct overland route for an oil pipeline from the Caspian Sea to Turkey would begin in Azerbaijan and pass through Armenia. Yet no such pipeline has ever been constructed due to political instability: Azerbaijan and Armenia fought a war over Nagorno-Karabakh and remain at loggerheads, while Turkey’s border with Armenia has been closed since 1993 in solidarity with Azerbaijan.

    With the Russo-Georgian clash illustrating the vulnerability of Georgia, through which the BTC pipeline passes, Armenia’s importance has increased. Turkish President Abdullah Gul, on a groundbreaking visit to Yerevan last week for a Turkish-Armenian soccer match, spoke about the need for the countries of the Caucasus to work together to enhance stability. To that end, Turkey has called for the creation of a regional cooperation group comprising Turkey, Russia, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan.

    The trajectory of the Russo-Georgian conflict during the next few months could be critical in determining what happens in the Middle East. If mediation succeeds in bringing the two sides together and defusing the crisis, Russia will not find it necessary to turn to Iran. If the successful mediation is Turkish, then Turkey will have demonstrated a unique ability to bring stability to the Caucasus, broker Syrian-Israeli peace talks, and mediate between Iran and the West.

    On the other hand, if the conflict drags on, Russia’s ties to the West and Turkey will inevitably deteriorate. Facing diplomatic isolation and possibly even sanctions, Russia may forge a strategic alliance with Iran, thereby drastically increasing Iranian influence in the Middle East.

     

    \\\ a freelance writer and reviewer based in Beirut. He wrote this commentary for THE DAILY STAR.is

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  • Russia Says Karabakh Peace In Sight

    Russia Says Karabakh Peace In Sight

     

     

     

     

     

    By Emil Danielyan

    Russia expects the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan to meet again shortly after next week’s Azerbaijani presidential election and reach a framework peace agreement on Nagorno-Karabakh, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in a newspaper interview published on Tuesday.

    He stressed the importance of a Nagorno-Karabakh settlement and the normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations for Armenia’s security and economic development.

    “There remain two or three unresolved issues which need to be agreed upon at the next meetings of the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan,” Lavrov told the “Rossiiskaya Gazeta” daily. “Our understanding is that such meetings will take place shortly after the forthcoming [October 15] presidential elections in Azerbaijan.”

    “As one of three mediators, we have a sense that a denouement is quite real,” he said, adding that the two other mediating powers, the United States and France, also see a “very real chance” of a resolution of the Karabakh conflict.

    The mediators have been trying to get the conflicting parties to accept the basic principles of Karabakh peace that were formally put forward by them in November 2007. Senior French, Russian and U.S. diplomats co-chairing the OSCE Minsk Group discussed the possibility of another Armenian-Azerbaijani summit during the most recent talks with the Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers held in New York late last month.

    Lavrov said the future of the so-called Lachin corridor, which provides for the shortest overland link between Armenia and Karabakh, is now the main stumbling block in the peace talks. He did not elaborate.

    The Russian minister was interviewed by a “Rossiiskaya Gazeta” reporter late last week as he flew to Yerevan to meet with Armenia’s President Serzh Sarkisian and Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandian. After the talks with Nalbandian he sounded cautiously optimistic about prospects for a breakthrough in the Karabakh peace process.

    However, a top aide to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliev, struck a cautious note as he commented on Lavrov’s upbeat statements in Yerevan. “Major issues have not been agreed upon,” Novruz Mammadov told the Azerbaijani Trend news agency.

    According to Lavrov, Armenia should be keenly interested in a Karabakh settlement in the wake of the crisis in neighboring Georgia which he said exposed “the vulnerability of its position” and highlighted the importance of having an open border with Turkey. “Armenia has huge difficulties communicating with the outside world,” he said. “It is in the fundamental interests of the Armenian people to unblock this situation as soon as possible.

    “It really has few geographic and political options. As soon as the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement becomes a fact, Turkey will be ready to help Armenia forge normal links with the outside world, naturally through the establishment of diplomatic relations between Ankara and Yerevan.”

    The remarks ran counter to a widely held belief in the West that Moscow is disinterested in the normalization of Armenia’s relations with Azerbaijan and Turkey for fear of losing geopolitical leverage against Yerevan.

  • RUSSIAN-AZERBAIJAN RELATIONS: TIME FOR A GRAND BARGAIN?

    RUSSIAN-AZERBAIJAN RELATIONS: TIME FOR A GRAND BARGAIN?

    By Alman Mir – Ismail

    Thursday, October 2, 2008

     

    The Georgian-Russian conflict in early August brought negative economic and humanitarian consequences for the South Caucasus. Carefully built East-West transport and energy corridors have come under question. Recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia by Russia presents another diplomatic difficulty for the countries of the region.

    Yet, in the aftermath of the conflict, Azerbaijan, Georgia’s neighbor and closest ally, finds itself in a unique position for an opportunity to advance relations with Russia. The ultimate prize would be the Kremlin’s support in the Karabakh conflict. There is no doubt in Baku, among both the public and politicians, that the key to the resolution of the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict lies in Moscow, as Russia was and remains Armenia’s closest military, political, and economic ally. Despite Azerbaijan’s persistent efforts to please Moscow and secure the return of the occupied territories, no success has been achieved yet.

    The current situation, however, presents a rare moment of opportunity for Baku to make Russia an offer it cannot refuse. The ingredients for the grand bargain have been piling up steadily over the past year. Early in the summer, Russian President Medvedev, during a trip to Baku, offered to buy all of Azerbaijan’s gas at the world market price. The Kremlin is obviously not interested in having an alternative gas exporter in its borders. The purchase of Azerbaijani gas would not only enable Moscow to remain the main energy provider to EU but would also help Gazprom fulfill its contractual obligations.

    On the other hand, the negative image that Russia created during the Georgian war is prompting Kremlin strategists to seek more cordial and friendly relations with another South Caucasus country, Azerbaijan, in order to demonstrate to the rest of the world that Russia is not a threat and aggressor to the former Soviet republics and does not intend to restore the Soviet Empire. Thus, Azerbaijan, with its pro-Western integration plans, presents the only chance for Russia to do this. Armenia is already heavily dependant on Russia, and Moscow does not consider it necessary to “win over” Yerevan.

    Gentler and more pragmatic relations with Azerbaijan would not only help Russia repair its image abroad but would also derail Azerbaijan’s pro-NATO and pro-EU course. It is no coincidence that President Medvedev called his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev a few weeks ago to discuss bilateral relations. The latter also traveled to Moscow to meet both Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin to advance the interests of both countries in the region.

    Finally, speculation has arisen in Baku that Moscow is pushing Azerbaijan’s political leadership to open a transit corridor through its territory to Armenia. The Kremlin’s sole remaining partner in the South Caucasus is significantly suffering from the war in Georgia, as transport from Russia to Armenia remains clogged in the closed borders. Armenia also has closed borders with Azerbaijan and Turkey, thus putting its economy under a real threat. Under the grand bargain, Azerbaijan could play a transit role, allowing Russia to ship cargo through its territory to Armenia.

    It seems that not only Russia understands the increased value of Azerbaijan. Geopolitical rivalry over this country has heated up in recent weeks, with U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney visiting Baku and making statements about the United States’ intention to remain an active player in the region. A look at the map of the South Caucasus shows that with Georgia falling out of the Russian orbit, Azerbaijan remains the last battlefield between the West and Russia.

    The situation for the grand bargain seems ripe, especially considering the new dialogue between Turkey and Armenia and the general willingness among Armenian leaders to normalize relations with its neighbors. The traditional belief that Russia should do its best to preserve the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia in order to keep its influence over them is not working any more. Russia will always be able to exert pressure and influence over these countries, long after the conflict is resolved. The resolution of the conflict, however, will bring a number of dividends to Russia, including a safer periphery and effective prevention of Radical Islam emerging in the region.

    Compromises on the issue of Karabakh and the restoration of the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan would pave the way for a much firmer and more solid partnership between Moscow and Baku. Moscow can and should push Armenia for more compromises on this issue in order to achieve a long-lasting peace. Otherwise, Azerbaijan, losing its hope to gain support from Kremlin, will continue to drift away toward the West.

  • Caucasus: No Easy Courtship

    Caucasus: No Easy Courtship

    There are positive signs in the budding relationship between
    Armenia and Turkey. But don’t expect too much too soon.
    by Timothy Spence
    30 September 2008

  • Culpabilities and Consequences

    Culpabilities and Consequences

    Culpability matters. We cannot be ‘forward-looking’ unless we know who we

    are dealing with, what is driving them and what they are capable of. We also

    need to know ourselves, particularly when we share culpabilities with others.

    Culpabilities are shared in this conflict, but they are different in scale and in

    nature.

    The culpabilities of Georgia’s President, Mikheil Saakashvili, are essentially

    those of temperament. He is ambitious, he is a gambler, and he wraps his

    ego around every problem. When he became President in January 2004, he

    set himself a priority: restoration of Georgia’s territorial integrity; fatefully, he

    also set a deadline: the end of his first term. He totally misjudged the

    correlation of forces and, even less excusably, the mood of Russia. Although

    he understood that Russia had no respect for weakness, he wrongly and

    rashly assumed that it would respect toughness as a substitute for strength.

    Towards the aspirations and apprehensions of Georgia’s de jure citizens in

    Abkhazia and South Ossetia, he showed even less understanding. Finally,

    though the culpability was not exclusively his, he had an existential faith in the

    backing of the United States, which he manipulated and stretched. But he did

    not provoke this conflict. He was provoked by those who knew how to do it.

    The culpabilities of NATO were those of wishful thinking and bureaucratic

    formalism. It was not always so. After 1991, the Alliance understood that

    without integration, the ills and insecurities of Central Europe’s immature,

    over-militarised, post-Communist democracies would pose threats to

    themselves and others. Although it grasped that the former USSR was more

    complex territory, it refused to treat it as forbidden territory, recognising that

    the restoration of ‘zones of special interest’ would have adverse

    consequences along Russia’s periphery and inside Russia itself. These

    principles survived the events of 9/11, but the means of securing them

    diminished. The elaborate architecture of NATO-Russia ‘cooperation’ and the

    focus on ‘programmes’ and process substituted for negotiation, blunted

    warnings and marginalised analysis of Russian policies and plans. For 17

    years, NATO almost completely ruled out the re-emergence of Russian

    military threats in Europe. Defence cooperation with Georgia advanced

    alongside an almost principled refusal to articulate a policy on its territorial

    conflicts or assess the dangers they posed.

    The culpabilities of the United States lay in over-confidence and neglect.

    Once Saakashvili was inaugurated, he became anointed by Washington, as

    Shevardnadze once had been, and the trepidations and warnings of less

    favoured members of Georgia’s elite were ignored (even after the November

    2007 crisis bore them out). Command arrangements for the

    Sustainment and Stability Operations Programme were inappropriate for a conflict zone.1

    Georgia’s vulnerability and importance, its mercurial leadership, the presence

    of US forces and the precariousness of the post-Bucharest security

    environment called for high level coordination and direction. There was none.

    Instead, by summer 2007 there were a multiplicity of agencies, freelancers,

    ‘signals’ and back channels leading nowhere.

    The culpabilities of the ‘international community’ were those of piety and

    impotence. Its leading institutions (the UN and OSCE) are deadlocked by the

    opposition of its leading members. Its mechanisms for conflict resolution

    institutionalise deadlock. It was never the territorial conflicts in Georgia,

    Azerbaijan, Armenia and Moldova that were frozen, only the mechanisms of

    ‘resolution’. In practice, the mechanisms became the resolution, and it is not

    surprising that in 2004 Georgians elected a president who found this

    intolerable.

    The culpability of the Russian Federation is overshadowed by the problem it

    poses. Seventeen years after the Soviet collapse, Russia continues to define

    its interests at the expense of its neighbours. In Yeltsin’s time the right of

    these neighbours to develop according to their own models and with partners

    of their own choosing was disputed in principle but in practice conceded for a

    complex of reasons, of which weakness was only one. Any concessions

    during the early years of Putin’s presidency were the product of weakness

    alone.2 The threshold was crossed after 2004 thanks to the coloured

    revolutions and their evident failings, the West’s further disregard of Russia’s

    kto-kovo (zero-sum) scheme of interests (Kosovo, enlargement, missile

    defence) and the re-emergence of usable Russian power.

    Russia’s culpability lay in priming the mechanism for war. The calibrated

    sequence of measures, political and military, undertaken after NATO’s

    Bucharest summit, the combat readiness of the 58th Army, the crescendo of

    provocations by South Ossetian forces peaking on 6-7 August and the

    presence of Russian ‘peacekeepers’ on the scene—not to say all the Russian

    ‘studies’ of Saakashvili’s aims and character—belie official claims of ‘disbelief’

    at news of the Georgian offensive.3 The occupation of Georgian ports and

    cities and the cutting of its transport arteries, threats to the BakuTbilisi

    Ceyhan pipeline, the extension of the conflict to Abkhazia and the ethnic

    cleansing of Georgians from South Ossetia also belie Russia’s ‘humanitarian’

    justification for intervention. Finally, the employment of components of the

    Black Sea Fleet, whilst supporting clear military objectives, followed a

    sequence of provocative statements (and, in Crimea, actions) regarding

    Ukraine since Bucharest and obliges us to consider the wider geopolitical

    purposes of the conflict.

    Where To?

    Russia’s Georgia operation appears to be an assiduously planned tactical

    step in pursuit of a strategic goal that lacks a strategy. Those who planned it

    judged correctly that Georgia’s incapacity and the West’s divisions would

    enable Russia to transform the political and military landscape in the south

    Caucasus and Black Sea Region without sanction or reprisal. Yet this does

    not mean there will be no long-term consequences for Russia. Neither does it

    mean that the West will agree to learn the lesson intended: in President

    Medvedev’s words, that Russia ‘will no longer tolerate’ its ‘behaviour’ (or, by

    implication, influence) in Russia’s ‘regions of privileged interest’. It will hardly

    advance this narrowly conceived aim if the West adopts a less charitable

    assessment of Russia’s intentions or if the latest application of ‘firm good

    neighbourliness’ destroys the residues of friendship on Russia’s periphery.

    Russia’s mood (resentment, vengefulness and the worship of power) has

    dominated reason, and so long as Russia is both bully and victim, it will draw

    errant and possibly dangerous conclusions whether others are meek or

    tough.

    The Georgian conflict has dealt a powerful blow to Medvedev’s liberal project,

    insofar as it existed, and handed Putin as much de facto power as he wishes to take. The political and psychological pressures on the former to be as

    strong as the latter can only incapacitate him. The need for ‘strength’ makes

    him hostage to constituencies that will never be his (defence industry and the

    armed forces), it undermines his power to stand up to ‘national’ capital (those

    who do not derive their wealth from integration into the global economy) or

    fight for those who do, and it deprives him of authority abroad. To invert

    Kissinger’s question, ‘when there is a problem with Russia, who do you call?’

    The conflict has unified the country, but in so doing it has made dissent more

    perilous and entrenched the positions of those who would be the first to suffer

    if a major and increasingly urgent reform of the bureaucracy, economy and

    energy sector took place.

    Yet then comes the question: for how long? For how long will the neoisolationists

    not see what the stock market collapse made obvious: Russia’s

    dependency on the global economy? For how long will they ignore the

    economic and social costs of the country’s ‘legal nihilism’? For how long will

    Russia’s derzhavniki (great power ideologists) disregard the implications of

    the South Ossetian/Abkhaz secession for ‘national formations’ in Russia

    itself? What will happen when those who see these things are no longer

    quiet? Will things get better, or will they get worse before they get better?

    Today it is hard to say.

    Today it is also hard to say whether the West will recover its nerve or

    continue to neuter itself. Yet some changes are visible, and they are not

    entirely bad. It has become clear to all but the most besotted that the 1990’s

    paradigm of ‘partnership’ has exhausted itself. Although many G7 leaders

    speak with conviction about the importance of maintaining cooperation with

    Russia, few will pretend that cooperation is enough. Fewer now doubt

    Russia’s determination to resurrect its dominance over the former USSR, and

    whilst some would accommodate to this, virtually no one believes that a

    strong Russia is good for Europe.

    By establishing the NATO-Georgia Commission, by mandating it to ‘follow up

    the decisions taken at the Bucharest Summit’ and by assessing the needs of

    the Georgian army, NATO has quietly let Russia know that the game is not

    over. The EU’s agreement to conclude an association agreement with

    Ukraine in 2009 sent the same message: integration with Russia’s neighbours

    (and the EU’s own) will intensify rather than diminish. Prime Minister Putin

    might be right to ask ‘what is the West?’ Whatever it is, it is not leaving.

    There would be much to lose if it did. The notion that spheres of influence,

    established at the expense of countries residing in them, will generate less misery

    than they did before 1914 or prove any more stable is based on myth

    rather than realism. Our task is not to vindicate Russia’s outmoded paradigm

    of security, but create the conditions that will induce Russians, in their own

    interests, to question it. That will not be done by symbolic and provocative

    steps (e.g., MAP), but it will require practical measures to strengthen the

    security of neighbours and restore their confidence in the West and

    themselves.

     

     

     

    James Sherr September 2008

  • Armenia needs open borders for energy

    Armenia needs open borders for energy

    YEREVAN, Armenia, Sept. 30 (UPI) — Though Russia and several other countries are using energy as a political tool, Armenians need to take a practical view of opening their borders, officials say.

    In an interview Tuesday with the Armenian news agency A1 Plus, President of NATO Parliamentary Assembly Jose Lello said the high cost of energy and export prices for Armenia challenges conventional market conditions.

    “So I think the Armenian people and Armenian authorities must look on perspectives emerging from open borders with great pragmatism,” he said.

    Russian energy giant Gazprom Thursday said it would increase the price of gas exported to Armenia by 40 percent starting in April, and on Wednesday Azerbaijan, citing territorial disputes, said there are no plans to alter the route of the proposed Nabucco pipeline through Armenian territory.

    Commenting on Russian aggression in the Caucasus region and its forceful moves in the energy market, Lello said Moscow should realize energy does not define geopolitical strategy, despite mounting demands for oil and gas in the region.

    “Russia has to understand that life is not only energy, oil and gas,” he said.