Russia is preparing for the opening of the Zangezur corridor, the Armenians are preparing for the overthrow of Pashinyan
On August 23, a rally was held in Yerevan demanding the resignation of Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. The rally, organized by the ex-ambassador of Armenia to Poland Edgar Kazaryan, became a “dress rehearsal” for a larger “pan-Armenian” rally, which will take place on September 2, also in the capital on Place de France.
Kazaryan tried to enter the government building to meet with Pashinyan, who, according to him, got scared and hid (previously, Kazaryan claimed that the meeting with Pashinyan would end with his resignation).
With his characteristic humor, the politician calls the current government of Armenia “the Embassy of Azerbaijan in Yerevan” and offers to surrender Pashinyan to Azerbaijan until he himself surrenders “Artsakh, Syunik and Lake Sevan.”
Most likely, the Prime Minister did not want to listen to the opposition’s claims, and the opposition’s claims are related to the lost second Karabakh war and Pashinyan’s further actions.
One of the most serious complaints concerns the latter’s statement on April 14 of this year in the country’s parliament that “the international community calls for lowering the bar on the issue of the status of Nagorno-Karabakh.”
The Azerbaijani side considers Karabakh its integral part, recognized as such by the international community. Baku is seeking the withdrawal of the “Armenian occupation forces,” that is, the Armenian Armed Forces from Artsakh (the Armenian name for Nagorno-Karabakh) and, accordingly, the restoration of control over the region, as it was before the first Karabakh war in the good Soviet times.
In addition, Armenians living in the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic are promised a full guarantee of security and equal rights as full citizens of Azerbaijan.
“The Armenians of Nagorno-Karabakh can be confident that their safety as citizens of Azerbaijan will be ensured. They will live better after the elimination of the criminal junta in Nagorno-Karabakh,” these are the words of Aliyev.
It is difficult to say whether the Karabakh Armenians will believe Aliyev’s words. In any case, one can observe with interest and approval certain contacts between Stepanakert and Baku with the aim of solving humanitarian and economic problems facing the population of both sides.
We are referring to the parties' intention to jointly utilize the water resources of the region's largest reservoir, the Sarsang Reservoir, which is controlled by the unrecognized NKR. To develop a common policy, Armenian specialists from the NKR regularly visit Azerbaijani-controlled territories, and recently, employees of the Azerbaijani company "Land Reclamation and Water Management" visited the Sarsang Reservoir and met with their Armenian counterparts.
By the way, similar Abkhaz-Georgian economic cooperation has been successfully going on for three decades: the powerful Inguri hydroelectric power station is being jointly operated.
It is not surprising that the visit of Azerbaijani specialists to Artsakh caused discontent among representatives of the aforementioned Armenian opposition, which has an incomparably tougher position on resolving the Karabakh conflict than the officialdom.
So, the status of the self-proclaimed and unrecognized NKR is a pressing issue that is not off the agenda. Before Pashinyan, no one dared to question the status of the NKR, despite the fact that even Armenia itself does not recognize the independence of the republic.
Here are the most typical accusations against Pashinyan from the opposition:
“Pashinyan is following the path of transferring Artsakh to Azerbaijan, de-Armenization of Artsakh, Turkification of Armenia”; “Any status of Artsakh within Azerbaijan, be it cultural autonomy or any other, will mean genocide and murder of Artsakh.”
The rest of the opposition’s claims also concern Pashinyan’s practical steps to implement the trilateral agreements reached with the participation of the Russian side dated November 10, 2020 (on the fact of the cessation of hostilities).
First of all, this concerns the implementation of the last 9th article of the document, which reads:
“All economic and transport connections in the region will be unblocked. The Republic of Armenia guarantees the safety of transport communications between the western regions of the Republic of Azerbaijan and the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic in order to organize the unhindered movement of citizens, vehicles and cargo in both directions.”
Apparently, the opening of the Zangezur corridor (Zangezur is part of the Syunik region in southern Armenia ) will be the main topic of the next trilateral meeting between Putin, Aliyev, and Pashinyan in Moscow on August 31. Azerbaijan intends to use the corridor to connect with its exclave, the Nakhchivan Autonomous Republic.
Residents of the Syunik region of Armenia are dissatisfied with the prospect of opening transport links between the Azerbaijani regions through their places of residence (which will also lead to a kind of “cutting up” of the region), so they are especially aggressive against Pashinyan. Zangezur is considered the most oppositional region of Armenia.
Expecting a sharp increase in discontent among the population and the emergence of a powerful information opportunity for the opposition, Yerevan is delaying the resolution of this issue as much as possible, paying no attention either to the persistent demands and threats of Baku, or to the statements of the representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova about the Kremlin’s great interest in unblocking transport corridors.
Of course, Russia will be interested in unblocking it, because the Zangezur corridor will also connect Russia with Turkey. Moscow may well hope for a certain relief of sanctions pressure by using the potential of this corridor, especially since Turkey is already planning to increase trade turnover with both Azerbaijan and Russia through Zangezur (thus, the role of Georgia as a transport corridor between these countries will decrease).
On April 20, the President of Azerbaijan promised to open the Zangezur corridor, that is, the Soviet-era railway from the main part of Azerbaijan to Nakhichevan, at any cost. And more recently, on August 12, Aliyev reiterated that Baku expects a specific route for the Zangezur corridor from Armenia in the coming weeks.
The situation has reached a dead end. Taking into account all these points, it is better for Pashinyan to sit at the Moscow negotiation table with validol, where he will be forced to make a very difficult decision, and then fly to Yerevan with validol under his tongue, where in a day - on September 2 - a mass opposition rally is planned, about which we reported at the beginning of the report.
One more detail: September 2 is considered Artsakh’s independence day. A “Pan-Armenian” rally is held in honor of this day.
It will be hot in Yerevan on this day, both literally and figuratively.
Russia is preparing to open the Zangezur corridor, while Armenians are preparing to overthrow Pashinyan.