Azerbaijani political expert on current state of Armenia-Turkey dialogue and its influence on Karabakh conflict resolution

Turkish PM Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s special envoy recently met with Armenian President Sargsyan in Yerevan. In your opinion, what is the purpose of the visit?

This move was quite predictable in the light of latest developments. There is some advance in the Armenia-Turkey normalization. The Turkish media reports that the sides are ready to come up with new initiatives. I think a formula that will help to overcome deadlock in the Armenian-Turkish relations can be found. Hopefully, it will not affect the settlement of the Karabakh conflict. I believe that the visit by the Prime Minister’s special envoy signals that Ankara has found such a formula.

Being supporter of the Turkey-Armenia normalization, in your opinion, may the U.S. go ahead with this goal to detriment of Azerbaijan?

The United States has long done so. Both Washington and Moscow have repeatedly stated that the Armenian-Turkish rapprochement and the Karabakh conflict should be resolved separately from each other.

I believe Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan and Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan will still be exerted considerable pressure from the U.S. during a meeting in Washington. Therefore I am inclined to believe that Ankara will have to move away from its original political line.

As a result, there is a legitimate question: why does Washington support Armenia, which is a strategic ally of Russia? I think that Washington believes that Baku and Tbilisi have already been cooperating with the States in sufficient degree. Therefore, the U.S. aims to alienate Yerevan from Moscow and bring it closer to itself. The U.S. will be acting quite tough in this matter.

Recently Iranian Foreign Minister said that Tehran has sent its proposals on settlement of the Karabakh conflict to the conflicting sides. In your view, what is the reason for such a move?

Iran tried to mediate to bring resolution to the Karabakh conflict once. Back in the early 90's, during the active phase of the conflict, officials from Azerbaijan were visiting Tehran, who was active on this issue, and there were hopes that it can influence on Armenia. But after Shusha was caputured and Popular Front of Azerbaijan came to power, Azerbaijan fully reoriented its foreign policy toward Ankara. At that time we could hear accusations related to occupation of Shusha by Armenia against Tehran. Honestly, to this day it remains a mystery for me what Iran had to do with this matter.

Then, over time, the relations between Baku and Tehran experienced complications and Azerbaijan lost trust in Iran. Azerbaijan’s hopes for Karabakh conflict settlement became more and more linked with Washington. Now, however, Azerbaijan has become apparently frusturated with Washington's mediation in the Karabakh issue.

Iran’s recent proposal on the Karabakh settlement is due to the fact that the U.S. wants to isolate it from the rest of the world, but Iran strongly opposes this.


/Day.Az/