Armenia caught between Karabakh "hammer" and diaspora" anvil

The planned meeting between Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan will have already taken place by the time this article is published. Both of them are involved in the international nuclear safety conference in the U.S. It is also assumed that each of them will meet with U.S. President Barack Obama individually. These meetings and negotiations should help to untie a tight knot of conflicts and contradictions between Armenians and Turks, Armenians and Azerbaijanis. The parties have specific agreements - Zurich protocols and updated the Madrid principles - worked out with the assistance of international mediators on the talks’ table. However, there is still no assurance that they will be adopted, ratified and implemented. And the main point is not clashing interests of regional and great powers in the region.

We are used to see "Armenians" in general as enemy in the Armenian-Turkish and the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflicts that have lasted for many decades. This is true. However, despite the undeniable dominance of common goals, there are clear differences and divergences of interests between Nagorno-Karabakh separatist, the Republic of Armenia and the Armenian diaspora. This may seem surprising, but, nevertheless, the fact is that Armenia is more than just suffering from the conflict with Azerbaijan and Turkey and its people carries burdens of  historical animosity on shoulders while Armenia’s interests are time and again sacrificed for unrealistic requirements of the Karabakh separatists and the Diaspora.

As a result of hostility with its neighbors, the country drove myself into economic blockade, lost about a third of the population over two decades of conflict. The last year's crisis saw 20% economic downturn in Armenia (the highest in the CIS) with the external debt reaching almost 50 percent of GDP. Armenia survives thanks to remittances of Armenian emigrants for their relatives, foreign loans and aid, Diaspora while there are no prospects for improvement. Rulers and propagandists in Yerevan boast high places that allegedly Armenia takes in various international economic freedom rankings.  Perhaps Armenia does have freedom, but no economy. Those crumbs that are available are distributed between the approximate oligarchic groups in the "manual mode" ignoring existing laws and regulations.

Diaspora provides funds for roads, museums, cultural and educational programs, but does not make significant investment in industrial production. However, the local labor force is cheap and quite qualified, and there are many large multinational companies are either owed or managed by ethnic Armenian . These companies may open branches in Armenia and move manufacture of some of high-tech products to the country. But this does not happen, as any business project requires to determine the sales market before making a decision. In fact, the Armenian market is extremely narrow. Iran has shielded its domestic market by high customs barriers. The country also faces some Western sanctions. The access to the solvent regional markets like Turkey and Azerbaijan is closed because of own policy of Armenians. This makes it impossible to transit goods to the markets of Russia, Europe and the Middle East through this country.

In other words, Armenia will be able to survive, but it is in no position to achieve a sustainable development without settling relations with its neighbors. Understanding this, as well as elementary comparison of demographic and economic resources of Armenia and Azerbaijan, not to mention that of Turkey, forced President Levon Ter-Petrosyan in the mid-1990s to seek compromise with Ankara and Baku in conflict resolution. However, this policy was met with sharp opposition both in Nagorno-Karabakh and by the Diaspora. As a result, the first president of Armenia was forced to resign enabling representative of the Karabakh clan Robert Kocharian to seize the power.

The priority task for Kocharian and his supporters was to complete separation of Nagorno-Karabakh from Azerbaijan and annex it to Armenia in a legal way.

To achieve his goal, Kocharian was even ready to give part of the Armenian territory (in the Meghri region) to Azerbaijan. Now his successor, another representative of the Karabakh clan President Serzh Sargsyan seeks to exchange old "genocide" claims of Armenians for Turkey's refusal to support Azerbaijan in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. However, exchange efforts of both Robert Kocharian and Sargsyan have failed so far.

The Turkish government ruled by Erdogan and Gul rejected the cynical deal proposed by Sargsyan and his American patrons, after a little hesitation and took a principled position, saying that Armenian-Turkish normalization and opening the border will not happen without progress in the Karabakh conflict resolution. And the Diaspora Armenian Diaspora adamantly opposed to give up the idea of "Hay Dat”, Armenian revenge against Turkey.

Well, persistence is the distinctive quality of Armenians. They owe their many achievements in the crafts, science, art and sports to this quality. But this quality brought historical tragedies for them in politics. Perhaps they simply needed to pay attention to the so-called Plyats principle which reads: "Who wants more than he can have, may end up with less than he might have had.”

But, apparently, the Karabakh clan, intoxicated with power and wealth, does not bother to be prudent. Even the current Yerevan, which is far from being prosperous, is much better than dreary provincial Khankandi for them. They have already secured their personal success in life. As for the diaspora, it is not hard to wage a relentless struggle against Turkey, while being in comfort and security in the U.S., France or any other such place. It should take into account that the Armenian Church and generation-old idea of retribution on Turks is a factor allowing Armenians abroad to preserve their ethnic identity and does not dissolve in a globalizing world. Dozens advocacy organizations have been working in this field for many decades whose employees have made collection and expenditure of substantial funds to fight for the recognition of "genocide" their source of existence.

Caught between Karabakh "hammer" and diaspora "anvil", Armenia more deeply plunges into the socio-economic stagnation in the quagmire of financial debt. The current situation in the country is becoming intolerable and cannot last forever. So far, the united opposition led by Former President Levon Ter-Petrosyan has been limited to verbal criticism of the Sargsyan government. But when the collapse of his policy becomes obvious, there will be a need to take a decisive action in order to sober up the mass of the Armenian population from the nationalist fervor and advance a positive program of reconciliation with its neighbors on the principles of equal security, respect for the rights of all citizens regardless of ethnicity and religion, development through resuming cooperation. I think we won't have to wait long for this... 


Rasim Musabayov,
Azerbaijani political expert