Part 3
Since the military defeat of Armenia in 2020 and the sidelining of France and the United States in the negotiations leading to the November 9, 2020 ceasefire, Paris and Washington have realized their mistake and do not know how to correct it.
Gaidz Minassian
Since Armenians’ 2020 defeat in Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh), an existential crisis has erupted within the public discourse. The shockwave produced by this trying time has compelled Armenians to ask hard questions and face these issues.
With the backdrop of the war in Ukraine, Azerbaijan’s aggression against Armenia raises many questions that can be organized into seven points: impunity, neutrality, legality, security, unity, reality, and sovereignty.
Legality
Azerbaijani aggression in Armenia is in clear violation of international law. Baku attacks a sovereign state whose territorial integrity is recognized within its current borders. Respect for international legality obliges the powers to become more involved in this conflict to enforce international legal standards and not create a precedent in changing borders by force. Azerbaijan has for years violated international humanitarian law––the right to war (Jus ad bellum) and the law in war (Jus in bello).
Baku alleges that Armenia attacked it first and that Armenians are experiencing what Azerbaijanis have for 30 years. Azerbaijan has created a puppet republic in Zangezur to create a diversion and gradually launch a reverse “Karabakhization” of the conflict. But that cannot take, because Azerbaijani aggression is not based on claims of self-determination of an Azerbaijani population present in Syunik region. Azerbaijan is attacking Armenia, not an Azerbaijani Autonomous Republic of Zangezur that is attacking Yerevan. The responsibility of the permanent members of the Security Council is colossal in the current deterioration of the situation in the South Caucasus. It is all the more so since the co-presidency of the Minsk Group consists of three of the five members of the P5. The Minsk Group has however totally failed.
The Minsk Group failed because of Russian machinations, but also because the French and American co-chairs did not want to see that the priority of their interests was that of the status of Artsakh to be determined and not the evacuation of the territories under Armenian control. Azerbaijani diplomacy has done what is necessary to demand above all else the return of these territories to its fold. And it worked. Since the military defeat of Armenia in 2020 and the sidelining of France and the United States in the negotiations leading to the November 9, 2020 ceasefire, Paris and Washington have realized their mistake and do not know how to correct it. The only possible way to establish itself in the region and consolidate Western influence is Artsakh’s status. Nothing else.