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«Highlights», ÕII.2004 |
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Vladimir KAZIMIROV
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KARABAKH AND UN
SECURITY COUNCIL RESOLUTIONS The resolutions of UN Security Council are
among the decisive documents in the modern international life. All the UN
member-countries, of course, focus their attention on the complete and
well-timed (and not postponed or selective) fulfillment of those
documents. There are 4 resolutions on
Karabakh conflict (822, 853, 874 and 884). All of them were adopted in the
heat of Karabakh war, from April 30 to November 12, 1993. In the recent years, the fulfillment of
resolutions has been more frequently demanded by Baku but only concerning the
part of immediate, complete and unconditional withdrawal of occupation forces
from 7 regions of Azerbaijan occupied by Armenian-Karabakh troops and return
of their refugees to those territories.
Now Nagorno Karabakh itself is also more and more persistently
enclosed by those demands; Heydar Aliyev was more moderate in this issue (too much formal
logic hardly ever applicable in conflict situations is necessary in order to
refer Nagorno Karabakh to occupied lands). To put it differently, Azerbaijan, in
essence, reduces the requirements of resolutions to the liberation of
occupied territories. This country wants to draw attention to this grave
consequence of an armed conflict, to the pain of the forced migrants. Meanwhile, Azerbaijan wants to push to the
background, to delay the elimination of the major disputable problem and
cause of the conflict, determination of Nagorno Karabakh's status. 1. Adequate treatment of the UN Security
Council resolutions is impossible without considering the hierarchy of their
demands, without taking into account the fact that in the summer and in the
fall of 1993 did the culmination of the war arrive. That's why the priority
and the most important demand was to cease fire, all
the military and hostile activities. This demand passes through all the 4
resolutions as if it is their common pivot. UN Security Council brought forward this
demand as early as in the very first resolution N 822 adopted on April 30
1993, but a whole year and another 3 resolutions were not enough for its
fulfillment. It's high time we specified which side
violated this basic demand of all resolutions and bears special
responsibility for the fact that its failure to solve this cardinal problem
laid the foundation for the failure of almost all other demands, a complex
non-fulfillment of the Security Council resolutions. Of course, nobody is innocent here, but, no
doubt, the "palm" belongs to the Azeri side. Even having lost the
control over its territories Azerbaijan's leaders both in the years of A. Elchibey and H. Aliyev were
persistent in their attempts to achieve a sudden change on the front and
solve the conflict by force as if they were unaware of their own
responsibility for the occupation and its extension. In the years of Russia's
active mediation, a whole calendar of cases of cease-fire breaking by both
sides, evasion from such agreements and other cases of underestimation of
peace-making initiatives accumulated (resolution N 884 also speaks about this
in Aesopian language). With all the four resolutions of UN Security Council,
three times did Baku directly neglect (December 1993 and February 1994) the
chances of putting an end to military operations. Cease-fire was achieved with Russia's
assistance on May 12 1994 not so much on the basis of the UN Security Council
resolutions, rather, on the basis of April 15 1994 statement of the Council
of CIS country-heads, anyway, they had a common goal. This agreement was
already different as compared with the previous ones, it wasn't a temporary
one or envisaged for several days only, but it was perpetual (by definition).
i.e. actually permanent, and owing to the
persistence of Moscow, it was not signed by two sides only as it was done
before but by all the three sides of the conflict (not only Baku and Stepanakert, but also Yerevan). 2. ..... 3. The demand on liberation of the occupied
territories or immediate withdrawal of all the occupation forces also passes
through all resolutions. Baku claims that all the resolutions demand
unconditional withdrawal, but this only refers to July 29 resolution
N 853. How did the word "unconditional" disappear from resolutions
N874 and N884? Did it disappear by
accident, because of absent-mindedness? What if it disappeared in consequence
of regular non-fulfillment by one of the sides of the major requirement,
i.e., to cease military operations. Who could have expected to withdraw the
forces without ceasing the fights? And who didn't want to cease them? The UN
Security Council couldn't have compensated for non-fulfillment of its
resolutions. On this very background did the unconditional demand turn into a
subject of negotiations between the sides. For many
times this issue has been a subject of negotiations but it wasn't solved
because of the position of Armenians and because of the fact that Baku
immediately insisted on the withdrawal from all the territories, even from Shushi and Lachin, without even
showing any willingness to touch upon the Nagorno Karabakh status. 4. The UN Security Council resolutions
contain a number of other demands and appeals that remained non-fulfilled: a) "to restore
economic, transport and energy communications in the region" (853);
"to eliminate all the obstacles to communication and transport"
(874). From the very start of the conflict, Azerbaijan made use of the total
blockade of Nagorno Karabakh and Armenia meanwhile accusing Armenia of Nakhijevan's blockade. To fulfill those demands he puts
forward the liberation of the lands as a preliminary pre-condition. Besides, Baku broke off its contacts in all
the spheres with Armenia and the more so with Nagorno Karabakh; b) a number of
appeals were raised in the negotiation process. Since as early as on May 19 1992,
Azerbaijan refused to participate in the Minsk conference unless the
Armenians left Shusha and Lachin
occupied by them and on April 6 1993 they left the consultations of the
"Minsk Five" in Geneva, the UN Security Council resolutions
proposed that "negotiations should be immediately resumed within the
framework of the Minsk Group peace process" (822), persistently urged to
refrain from any actions hampering the peaceful settlement of the conflict
and to "continue the negotiations within the framework of the Minsk
Group, as well as by means of direct contacts" (853), and to convene an
urgent Minsk conference (874). The negotiations within the framework of the
Minsk Group continued in 1994, as for direct contacts with Nagorno Karabakh,
Baku completely contracted them at the end of 1993 against resolutions N853,
N874 and N884. The resolutions call "the local Armenian
forces" (822), "Armenians of the Nagorno Karabakh region of
Azerbaijan" (853, 884) a side opposed to it. By saying direct contacts,
the resolutions meant the ones between Baku and Stepanakert
(also because the agreements on cease-fire reached with the assistance of
Russia are mentioned there for many times and all these agreements were
concluded with Stepanakert in 1993, but Yerevan was
not a party). One may sum up all this as follows: AZERBAIJAN persistently wouldn't fulfill the
main demand of the UN Security Council resolutions, to cease the fire,
military and hostile operations, which had a negative impact on the fulfillment
of other demands. Azerbaijan doesn't fulfill them at present, either as far
as the following points are concerned: 1) restore the economic, transport and
energy communications in the region, 2) use the direct contacts with Nagorno
Karabakh, 3) convene a Minsk conference. ARMENIA AND NAGORNO KARABAKH refuse to meet the demand of withdrawing the occupation
forces from Azerbaijani regions beyond the boundaries of Nagorno Karabakh
insisting on a package and all-embracing settlement. ARMENIA didn't completely meet the appeal to
exert restraining influence on Nagorno Karabakh and at present by mistake substitutes
for it in the negotiation process, which though differently but again
distorts the real configuration of the conflict. As a result, the truce that has lasted for
more than 10 years now remains the main achievement. It's impossible to
consider the UN Security Council resolutions on Karabakh as fulfilled and the
position of sides of the conflict as adequate to them. It's significant that
the UN Security Council didn't adopt any other resolutions on this conflict
as their non-fulfillment by the sides undermines its authority. Of course, the resolutions adopted 11 years
ago can hardly be considered free of mistakes and valid for all times. They
were dictated by the realities of that time. Now when for this or that purpose
attempts to involve UN in the settlement of the Karabakh conflict are again
made it's important to sum up the activity of last 10 years. We shouldn't
shut our eyes to the past, we should learn our
lesson from it. We should demand from the leaders of all the
sides, in all forms and from any tribune a rigid political will for
settlement, serious efforts and energetic negotiations (instead of false
gestures of maneuvering, information war and propaganda performances). So
far, their efforts have proved to be obviously insufficient. They should coordinate the bases of a
peaceful settlement, which would make it possible to adopt a new resolution
of the UN Security Council in the future in order to support a historical
reconciliation between Azeries and Armenians. The international community should put a
question before the sides, if they are able to recognize the Nagorno Karabakh
status a disputable problem. It's clear to the whole world but only not to
the sides. No matter how hard it may seem, the
authorities of all the sides still need to pass this test on practicability
and capability of transition to a constructive search of settlement. If not,
then what caused the conflict, why did we hold negotiations for so many
years? If yes, then this would be the first step of deviation from the current
ultimatum demands excluding any solution to the problem except the one in
favor of them, the first step towards a more civilized solution to the
dispute, elimination of vain but dangerous appeals to its forced solution as
well as the grave consequences of the armed conflict. |
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