Archive
News for December 14-19
THE OSCE MG CO-CHAIRS DID NOT BRING ANY NEW
��� PROPOSALS� BUT INTENDS TO DO SO
��� BAKU, 14 DECEMBER, AZER-PRESS. 'Armenia's government means to continue the
��� dialogue with Azerbaijan about just resolution of the conflict over
��� Nagorno Karabakh, and we have good reasons to expect that the two parties
��� will soon be able to reach agreement on some aspects,' said the Russian
��� co-chairman of the OSCE MG Nikolay Gribkov upon arrival in Baku late on 13
��� December.
��� He, and his French and American colleagues Jean-Jacques Gayard and Keri
��� Kavano came from Nagorno Karabakh.
��� In the opinion of Mr Gribkov, Azerbaijan and Armenia alike shall have to
��� accept serious compromises for otherwise the conflict cannot be resolved.
��� 'There must be no winner and no loser, and neither side should feel
��� injured because otherwise resolution is out of the question,' said Mr
��� Gribkov.
��� He added that the co-chairmen had not brought any new proposals to Baku.
��� 'Our trip is on the introductory side, and we shall think of new proposals
��� when we are able to sum up our meetings in Armenia, Nagorno Karabakh and
��� Azerbaijan,' went on Mr Gribkov.
��� Commenting on the presence in the Russian delegation of his predecessor
��� Vladimir Kazimirov, Mr Gribkov said� that 'conflict resolution in Nagorno
��� Karabakh' was the 'first love' of Mr Kazimirov, who terminated his holiday
��� to return to the subject.
��� Mr Kazimirov told the press that he had come to Baku as a private person,
��� and that 'Mutual accommodations are necessary. I am glad that there is the
��� reason for regular meetings of the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan.
��� Previously, our negotiations were useless sometimes as there was no
��� interaction at such a high level.'
��� It should be remembered that Mr Kazimirov was suspended from his former
��� position on insistence of Azerbaijan. Mr Kazimirov, the protege of the
��� ex-defence minister of Russia Pavel Grachev, was not interested in
��� elimination of the antagonism and all the proposals that he used to make
��� only served the ends of the Armenian side.
��� The president of Azerbaijan did not mind openly Mr Kazimirov's being in
��� the delegation, although it is felt in Azerbaijan that this person may
��� spoil everything. Musavat's secretary Arif Hajiyev believes 'Mr Kazimirov
��� did not offer anything useful at the time, and Russia demonstrated that it
��� is not interested to have the problem solved by involving Mr Kazimirov in
��� the negotiations again. Clearly, Russia does not want to lose the chance
��� of pressurising Azerbaijan and Armenia.' It is believed in the PNFA that
��� Mr Kazimirov's return is designed to restore Russia's leadership of the
��� process.
��� Curiously, it was not long after the departure of the MG co-chairmen from
��� Yerevan and Karabakh that Armenia's foreign minister Vardan Oskanyan told
��� the press that Armenia still adhered to the three resolution principles.
��� These are the necessity of self-determination in Nagorno Karabakh,
��� security of its population and provision of geographical links with
��� Armenia.
��� Habarlar-L
�� WHAT BROUGHT MR KAZIMIROV TO BAKU?
��� BAKU, 15 DECEMBER, AZER-PRESS. Azeri political circles are worried by
��� Vladimir Kazimirov's involvement in the current negotiations about the
��� conflict over Nagorno Karabakh. A source said it was feared that Mr
��� Kazimirov might be made co-chairman of the Minsk Conference, the last
��� instance to resolve the conflict that will be gathered after the peace
��� treaty has been signed. Now, this position is occupied by Valentin
��� Lozinsky.
��� It is felt in Azerbaijan that should Mr Kazimirov take over from Mr
��� Lozinsky, this would mean that Russia demonstrates its negative attitude
��� towards possible resolution of the conflict.
��� Mr Kazimirov was the Russian co-chairman of the MG in 1992-1996 and put
��� forth the ideas that could not promote resolution; moreover, Mr
��� Kazimirov's proposals would aggravate the differences between negotiators.
��� Russia is not likely to have changed its attitude to the subject since.
��� Russia is still providing military assistance for Armenia thus violating
��� the balance in the region. However, the events in Chechnya make Russia
��� more cautious about how it deals with its neighbours in the Caucasus.
��� Mr Kazimirov told the press that 'he has nothing to do with replacement of
��� the Russian co-chairman in the OSCE MC so far (!).'� Asked whether he
��� would be helping the co-chairman of the OSCE MG Nikolay Gribkov, Mr
��� Kazimirov answered: 'I shall help him if he needs my help, which it not
��� clear yet. As it is, I am legally on leave having recently completed my
��� diplomatic mission in Costa Rica.'
��� THE PRESIDENT OF AZERBAIJAN MET THE OSCE MG
��� CO-CHAIRMEN
��� BAKU, 15 DECEMBER, AZER-PRESS. 'The international arena and the local
��� situation are favourable towards prompt resolution of Karabakh problem,'
��� said the OSCE MG chairman from France Jean-Jacques Gayard while meeting
��� with President Aliyev together with his colleagues from USA and Russia.
��� The co-chairmen of the Minsk Group last visited the region all together 13
��� months ago.
��� Azerbaijan then rejected the 'common state' proposal. In the opinion of
��� President Aliyev, the negotiation process have been delayed since and
��� there have not been any new ideas.
��� The presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia have been contacting directly
��� since April 1999, saying that they were ready to make necessary
��� compromises to resolve the confrontation.
��� According to President Aliyev, he and President Kocharyan were meeting to
��� help the OSCE MG find a solution; their dialogue does not mean that the
��� OSCE MG should be distanced from the parleys.
��� 'My conversations with Mr Kocharyan will be continued, however, the OSCE
��� MG should become more actively involved in the new phase of its
��� intermediary endeavours,' said President Aliyev. He thinks that 'the OSCE
��� MG wants to build its new proposals on the direct negotiations between the
��� two presidents as a productive way of reaching the desired results.'
��� The co-chairmen agreed to meet at some later point to discuss new
��� proposals for resolution of the conflict with consideration of the
��� recommendations received from the presidents of Armenia and Azerbaijan.
��� The co-chairmen said they were 'prepared to mobilise all the resources to
��� rehabilitate the territories damaged during the war' as allows the
��� cease-fire lasting for more than five years.
��� Representatives of IBRD, IMF, EBRD and UN attended the meeting of the
��� co-chairmen and the president.
��� Habarlar-L
�� ARMENIA RELEASES AZERBAIJANI POW.
��� As "a goodwill gesture," the Armenian authorities on 15 December
��� freed a 19-year-old Azerbaijani army conscript taken prisoner in
��� September 1998 on the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan,
��� AP and ITAR-TASS reported. Armenia released three and Azerbaijan
��� four prisoners in September (see "RFE/RL Newsline," 17 and 20
��� September 1999). LF
��� RFE/RL
��� KARABAKH ARMY COMMANDER FIRED.
��� Arkadii Ghukasian, president of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh
��� Republic, fired Samvel Babayan, commander of the Karabakh Defense
��� Army, on 17 December, RFE/RL's Stepanakert correspondent reported. Two
��� days earlier, a group of senior generals of the Defense Army
��� of the unrecognized Nagorno-Karabakh Republic issued a
��� statement accusing Ghukasian of exacerbating political
��� tensions, and calling on both the president and Babayan to
��� resign, Noyan Tapan and RFE/RL's Stepanakert correspondent
��� reported. Armenian Defense Minister Vagharshak Harutiunian,
��� who traveled to Karabakh on 15 December, pledged support for
��� Ghukasian the following day (see "RFE/RL Caucasus Report,"
��� Vol. 2, No. 50, 17 December 1999). An unknown number of
��� Karabakh parliamentary deputies and the heads of the
��� enclave's administrative districts issued similar statements
��� on 17 December, according to Noyan Tapan. LF
��� RFE/RL
�� Karabakh Leadership In Turmoil
��� The political leadership of Nagorno-Karabakh met for an emergency session on Thursday as a
��� bitter stand-off between the unrecognized
��� republic's President Arkady Ghukasian and the commander of its armed forces, General Samvel
��� Babayan, threatened to disrupt stability. Tension
��� in Stepanakert has run high since last Tuesday when Babayan was said to have assaulted
��� Karabakh's Prime Minister Anushavan Danielian, a
��� close ally of Ghukasian's.
��� Armenia's Defense Minister Vagharshak Harutiunian arrived in Karabakh the next day in a bid to
��� prevent what is becoming a serious political
��� crisis there. Sources in Stepanakert told RFE/RL that Harutiunian has urged Babayan to resign
��� but was rebuffed by the latter.
��� Babayan has been at odds with Ghukasian since last June when the latter sacked the previous
��� head of the Karabakh government close to the
��� powerful general. With the help of the Armenian government, Ghukasian has since managed to
��� seriously limit the general's hitherto dominant
��� role in political affairs.
��� An uneasy status quo in Karabakh politics has been disrupted recently by a series of
��� recriminations exchanged by the two men. Tension came to
��� a head following Tuesday's brawl between Babayan and the Karabakh premier in which the
��� latter suffered minor injuries.
��� Senior commanders of the Nagorno-Karabakh Defense Army brought a new twist in the
��� standoff on Wednesday when they issued a statement
��� saying that both Ghukasian and Babayan are to blame for the "dangerous political tension" and
��� must step down. The statement urged fresh
��� presidential elections as the only way to end the stalemate.
��� A spokesman for Ghukasian told RFE/RL that the Karabakh leader does not intend to resign. In
��� a statement released on Thursday, the Karabakh
��� government accused Babayan and his supporters of "resorting to provocative and violent acts."
��� Official sources quoted Defense Minister Harutiunian as throwing his weight behind the
��� embattled Karabakh president. "I agree with you and am
��� happy that our views coincide," Harutiunian said at a meeting with government members and
��� pro-Ghukasian parliamentarians, according to the
��� presidential press service.
��� In another development, 13 deputies of the Karabakh parliament supporting the Karabakh army
��� chief have demanded that the legislature meet for
��� an emergency session to discuss the situation. Local observers say they would try to impeach
��� Ghukasian. The parliament majority has so far
��� been loyal to the Karabakh president.
��� An emergency meeting of Karabakh's Security Council chaired by Ghukasian was still going on
��� as of late Thursday and no decisions were
��� announced by that time.
��� (Vahram Atanesian in Stepanakert)
��� RFE/RL
�� POWER STRUGGLE TURNS INCREASINGLY UGLY.
��� Armenia's most muscular political force, the Yerkrapah
��� [Country Defender] Union, has openly raised the issue
��� of removing the country's president, Robert Kocharian, from office.
��� Yerkrapah, an 8,000-strong paramilitary organization beholden to Vazgen
��� Sarkisian and his successors, is over-represented in the governing
��� Republican Party and dominates the territorial administrations, functioning
��� as the Defense Ministry's mechanism of control over the political system. At
��� the Yerkrapah congress on December 4, most delegates supported calls for
��� removing Kocharian and/or calling a pre-term presidential election in
��� 2000--that is, only two years into Kocharian's term of office--with the
��� obvious intention of replacing him. Those demands did not figure in the
��� congress' official resolution, but were contained in the keynote speeches
��� and were received enthusiastically. The congress was equally receptive to
��� speakers' insinuations that Kocharian's entourage was the real beneficiary
��� of the October 27 massacre which took the life of, among others, Prime
��� Minister Vazgen Sarkisian.
��� The congress elected the late prime minister as "perpetual chairman" of
��� Yerkrapah and a new leadership filled with foes of Kocharian. These include
��� the new chairman Major-General Manvel Grigorian, three other Defense
��� Ministry officials of major general rank, as well as Industrial
��� Infrastructure Minister Vahan Shirkhanian and Yerevan mayor Albert Bazeian.
��� Shirkhanian and two of the generals had been among the Defense Ministry's
��� envoys who attempted to pressure Kocharian into appointing a
��� military-dominated government on October 27.
��� The congress also proclaimed the Yerkrapah Union's loyalty to the army, to
��� the memory of Vazgen Sarkisian and to the person of his brother and
��� successor as prime minister Aram Sarkisian, urged the nation to rally around
��� the military and the prime minister (without mentioning the president), and
��� officially called for "uncovering the organizers and executants" of the
��� October 27 "coup d'etat"--an allusion and a warning to the presidential
��� camp. The investigation is in the hands of the Chief Military Prosecutor
��� Khachik Jahangirian and the Internal Affairs Ministry's Criminal
��� Investigations chief Mushegh Saghatelian, two Yerkrapah members and
��� Sarkisian cronies, who are believed to consider implicating Kocharian's
��� entourage in the "plot" and the assassinations. On December 15, the military
��� prosecutor began questioning Kocharian's foreign policy adviser and close
��� personal associate, Aleksan Harutiunian. It remains unclear whether
��� Harutiunian's status is that of witness or suspect. Kocharian, under
��� pressure, had to release Harutiunian from his post and was reduced to
��� expressing the hope that the investigators would treat his departing aide in
��� accordance with due process of law. Only days earlier, Kocharian had given
��� vent to his concern that the military investigators may be pressing the
��� arrested terrorists into giving false testimony for political ends.
��� Kocharian has only few means to counterattack. He has held unsuccessful or
��� inconclusive meetings with the parliamentary leadership, business circles,
��� intelligentsia representatives and the Catholicos of All Armenians, Karekin
��� II, at the seat in Holy Echmiadzin. None of those forces seem to have
��� rallied behind him. Kocharian is basically limited to issuing infrequent,
��� albeit acerbic, statements through his spokesman Vahe Gabrielian for
��� broadcast on national television, whose management remains loyal to the
��� president. Any move by the Sarkisian camp to replace that management should
��� be taken as a coup alert.
��� On December 13, presidential chief of staff and Security Council Secretary
��� Serge Sarkisian (no relation to Vazgen and Aram) called a news conference to
��� warn Yerkrapah leaders and unspecified military commanders that he is in a
��� position to reveal their involvement in corruption and crime.
��� Simultaneously, a "spontaneous" demonstration was held outside the main
��� government building--Aram Sarkisian's seat of power--in Yerevan to protest
��� against the detention of an independent parliamentary deputy, whom the
��� investigators accuse of complicity with the October 27 assassins. Serge
��� Sarkisian is one of Kocharian's most reliable and skillful supporters, but
��� his real power has receded dramatically of late. He was a powerful Minister
��� of National Security and Internal Affairs until earlier this year, when
��� Vazgen Sarkisian deprived Serge of half his power by separating National
��� Security from Internal Affairs. Aram Sarkisian then completed his brother's
��� work by pressuring Kocharian to release Serge Sarkisian from the Internal
��� Affairs portfolio. Kocharian rewarded his ally with the two posts on the
��� presidential staff, from which redoubt Serge Sarkisian can selectively open
��� the files he has been keeping on the president's adversaries. But Yerkrapah
��� members and deputies of the governing Republican Party---two interlocked
��� organizations--lost no time retorting that they, too, hold "compromising
��� materials" against Kocharian's supporters, including Serge Sarkisian, whom
��� detractors accuse of controlling an undue share of export-import operations.
��� The "Karabakh clan" factor renders Kocharian's position even more difficult.
��� Public resentment has been building in Armenia proper against Karabakh
��� natives--such as Kocharian and Serge Sarkisian--who are seen as exercising a
��� disproportionate share of power in Yerevan and are even being blamed for the
��� economic hardships that the struggle for Karabakh has imposed on Armenia.
��� Kocharian has the support of only two small parties in Armenia proper, both
��� of them linked to the "Karabakh clan." One of those parties, "Country of
��� Laws," is led from the shadows by none other than Serge Sarkisian; the
��� other, Right and Accord, is led also covertly by Samvel Babaian from his
��� Stepanakert headquarters. Serge Sarkisian and Babaian, both holding
��� lieutenant-general rank, are a former commander and present commander,
��� respectively, of the Karabakh defense forces. In Armenia's political system,
��� political parties are essentially fronts for groups in the military and
��� security establishment and individual commanders. This applies to both camps
��� involved in the current power struggle and poses the risk of turning
��� political rivalry into armed confrontation (Noyan-Tapan, Snark, Azg,
��� Armenpress, Armenian Television, Respublika Armeniya, Golos Armenii,
��� December 6-16; see the Monitor, October 28, November 1, 3, 8, 18, 24; The
��� Fortnight in Review, November 5, December 3).
��� Habarlar-L
