Signing is Half of the Matter. Fulfil!

In 1992-96 Ambassador Vladimir Kazimirov was the head of the Russian mediatory mission, Plenipotentiary Representative of the Russian President on the Nagorno Karabakh issues, participant in and co-chairman from Russia of the OSCE Minsk Group. Currently he is the Vice-President of the Association of Russian Diplomats.

2006 is full of hopes for progress, if not a breakthrough, in the resolution of the Karabakh conflict. The twelve-year experience of cease-fire, painful and distorted negotiation process with a series of pauses, intransigent positions and even openly declared claims of the conflicting parties provide grounds for caution: it is difficult, almost impossible to reach decisive agreements during one year. Though I would be glad to prove wrong with my skepticism.

To what extent are the conflicting parties able to reach an agreement? Apart from short-term, but quite well formulated agreements on ceasing military operations or fire, which were broken many times, only three agreements were achieved during 18 years of conflict and confrontation:

- On September 19, 1992 the Defense ministers of Azerbaijan and Armenia with the mediation of their Russian counterpart signed an agreement on a 60-day ceasefire in Sochi. The agreement was violated in two weeks.

- Only the second out of the three agreements is complied with in generally: the agreement of indefinite duration on ceasefire signed on May 12, 1994 (it was signed by the Armenian and Azerbaijani Defense ministers, as well as by the NKR Army Commander under the mediation of the Russian Foreign Ministry).

- Another agreement with no time limit either, was signed on February 6, 1995 according to which the sides pledged to consolidate the ceasefire regime (it was signed by the same three officials on the instruction of their leaders under mediation of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairmen from Russia and Sweden). This agreement is implemented as a formality, in reality it has been ignored for a long time now.

As one can see, there is nothing to boast about. The cease-fire and its observance have been the only real achievement. In spite of the many-year efforts of mediators, the parties didn't show any intention to meet each other halfway, seek solutions or agreements. Besides, signing the much desirable, almost unreachable agreements is only half of the job to be done: those agreements should be carried out duly with no breaks, which are with new catastrophes. Meanwhile, there is an unusually high tendency to break or fraught not to fulfill even the provisions of formulated documents. In this respect, the fate of the third agreement, that about settling incidents, is a case in point.

The mediators understood well how difficult it was to observe ceasefire in Karabakh without some usual measures, for example, without separating the forces from the contact line and creating a wide separation zone (as sometimes the positions of the two sides were only a couples of hundred meters away from each other); without pullout of heavy weapons; without use of international observers or neutral separation forces. Here incidents are almost inevitable, and it is indispensable to work out a clear mechanism of interaction in order to prevent their escalation and quench them rapidly.

The document would strengthen the ceasefire regime by defining the order of actions to be taken by the sides in case of incidents, their operative contacts both with the other side and the mediators in order to localize the anomaly, prevent escalation and increased mutual distrust, and, which was even more important, to prevent the dissemination of propaganda inciting hatred.

Each party to the conflict pledged to inform in written form the other side immediately about the time, character and the aftermath of the incident. The other side should investigate the fact or version, and give the answer within 6 hours, informing about the measures it had taken to eliminate the difficulties and resume the status-quo-ante. Besides, the sides should send the copies of those documents to the mediators to enable them to join the efforts immediately.

To make direct contacts easier, the sides exchanged the telephone numbers of their political and military leadership on 24-hour duty basis.

At the first glance, these issues were related to the military-technical affairs, but in this case, the cease-fires acquired political significance. For this reason, all the provisions of the document were elaborated with the leaders of the three parties - Heidar Aliyev, Levon Ter-Petrossyan and Robert Kocharian. On February 3, 1995, they received the texts of the document (send by me in Russian and by Anders Bjurner, a Swede diplomat, in English). This came to conform that the military leaders put their signatures on the instruction of the top leaders. The commitments were signed on February 4 and took effect on February 6.

Life proved the great need to implement such an agreement. Quite a great number of soldiers and peaceful residents are killed on the contact line. Sometimes it is a series of incidents followed by a shower of mutual accusations, and the situation is getting dangerously tense. Representative of OSCE Chairman in Office, Andzei Kasprzick, who has been carrying out a monitoring twice a month on the contact line, said recently that the number of those killed and wounded increased during 2005. That is, the sides suffer many losses, but fail to fulfill their commitments. Incidents are sometimes even necessary to someone to support the tension and incite hatred.

This story has grown into a crime fiction now. Ambassador Kasprzick who had been carrying out a monitoring since 1997 was surprised to learn about the document from my short article "Mediators are not baby-sitters," published in the Baku-based "Echo" newspaper in summer 2003. He inquired me about it and got acquainted with its text for the first time. Then I deliberately recalled the agreement in the press of the conflicting parties. The text was published. No reaction followed.

During the March 2005 parliamentary hearings in Yerevan with the participation of Armenia's Defense Minister Serge Sargsian (he was the one of those to sign the document) I stated that in spite of a lot of incidents the commitments are not fulfilled. Sargsian publicly answered that the Armenian side was ready to get back their fulfillment if the Azeri side does so. Baku that was intently followed the hearings could not have missed the words of the Armenian minister. But Baku keeps silent.

As I heard that Nagorno Karabakh leadership (Arkady Ghoukassian and Seyran Ohanyan) had the same position, I wrote about it in the press in April. Both Yerevan and Stepanakert confirmed their commitment in late 2005. I again informed the media, including Azerbaijani press. Baku failed to hear this too.

I realize well that Azeri defense Minister Safar Abiyev, an old friend of mine, is not obliged to react to the publication of a former OSCE Minsk Group co-chairman, a retired ambassador, a private person now. But there is the statement of the Armenian defense minister. There is the Azeri community that has the right to know why the document approved by Azerbaijan's "all-national leader" is being ignored. There are the wounded and the relatives of those killed because of the failure to fulfill the agreements. There is the Foreign Ministry, which is called to follow up the fulfillment of international documents. I believe that no nation, especially a nascent one, may be indifferent to its reputation.

The irresponsible approach to fulfillment of commitments is amazing. It seems as nobody cares for the people who die and the atmosphere that gets tenser. Moreover, Azerbaijan's moving its army positions ahead increases the number of incidents.

What is also typical, none of the parties withdrew its obligations and demanded amending the agreement. Nor did they accuse the other side of non-fulfillment! All the sides keep silent. Is it a deficit of political will? Or incomprehension of newly formed administrations of the importance of fulfilling the obligations? Or do they prefer to continue their propaganda war? Maybe, the document does not please Baku because of its ban on moving the positions? Or because it was also signed by the third party to the conflict - Nagorno Karabakh?

The indifference of the OSCE, which has been engaged in the conflict settlement for 14 years now, is even more mysterious. Especially as it has no other agreements and achievements on this conflict to its credit. On the occasion of the visit of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office Dimitrij Rupel to Yerevan and Baku (March 2005), I sent him an open letter, in which I stressed the problem of incidents and the sides' disregard of their obligations. I wrote to him: "The OSCE is also silent about this issue, even though it is the only agreement signed by all the parties thanks to its efforts." Neither the Chiarman-in-Office, nor the Secretary general or the OSCE Permanent Council took care about it. It was only at the London meeting in early 2005 that the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairmen slightly reminded the sides about their obligations.

Yet another point. I proposed to my Swedish partner, Ambassador Anders Bjurner that we, as two former co-chairmen, present jointly this problem to the OSCE structures and the parties. To be sure, I even sent copies of this message to Sweden through three independent routes in parallel. There was response from none of them. This also demonstrets how much the representatives of the European Union and Western democracies value the interests of the two peoples and the Karabakh settlement. Signed and off one's hands!

All this story shows whether the high signatures under the documents are of value in this conflict. As for failures of other obligations, for example, the one on ceasefire, I have already written about them several times.

That is the whole story about the parties' ability to conclude and fulfill agreements, and that of the OSCE to achieve peace in Karabakh. Prior to the signing an agreement, it is worth asking each party's representative questions about who and how will fulfill the assumed obligations. And the mediators – about whether the OSCE will supervise it.

So the slogan of 2006 and the following years should be: "Signing is half of the matter. The most important thing is implementing!"