I was skimming Derek Davison’s Foreign Exchanges Substack newsletter at the end of last week (January 20, to be exact) and came across an article about the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia. Now, I have to confess, I’m pretty sure that I couldn’t have found either of these countries on a world map – at least not very easily -- and I didn’t have any idea what they’re fighting about. So I decided to check this out.
Cast your mind back to the early 1990s. I was teaching Comparative Government when the Soviet Union broke up in 1991. I was supposed to teach about Russia in the pre-Soviet era (prior to 1917), the Soviet period (1921-1991), and post-Soviet Russia. This was hard to understand at the time, because Russia after the Soviet era was a moving target. It’s hard to understand now, because I haven’t paid much attention to the republics that seceded from the Soviet Union in 1991.
Here's a map of the breakaway Republics that became independent countries in 1991.
I have a hard time understanding this part of the world. Many of the post-Soviet states were not organized countries prior to becoming part of the Soviet Union, and in the post-Soviet era most of them have struggled to develop functional democracies and economies. People in the West sometimes derisively refer to the post-Soviet countries in Central Asia as “The Stans,” implying that there is little difference among Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. We may know that they are geographically close to the more easily recognized “Stans” – Pakistan and Afghanistan – but we know little more about them. Together, the post-Soviet “Stans” of Central Asia cover more than 1.5 million square miles (moving them above India and Argentina in the list of large countries) with 76 million people (almost half of them in Uzbekistan. Who knew that? I tell you, every answer generates more questions.).
This map will provide the framework for the problem Derek is talking about today.
This is a complicated story and I don’t plan to provide detailed information about this world hot spot. You can google it if you want to know more. That’s what I did. Here’s what it helps to know:
All of the region known as The Caucasus – Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia -- which includes the land bridge between the Caspian Sea and Black Sea between Turkey and Iran to the south and Russia to the north – belonged to the Soviet Union until that entity broke apart in 1991.
Azerbaijan existed in the two parts you can see on the map – the Nakhichevan ASSR (the small part on the border with Iran) and Azerbaijan SSR (Soviet Socialist Republic). Two railway connections linked these two parts of Azerbaijan, and, since the Soviet Union owned everything, communication between these two regions was not difficult
Since 1989, Azerbaijan has blocked shipments of material from landlocked Armenia; in response, Armenia blockaded transit between Nakhchiven and Azerbaijan proper. The breakup of the Soviet Union meant that there was no longer an external power to force open trade and communication routes. NOTE: Armenia is one of only two “double-landlocked” countries in the world – meaning that it is surrounded only by other landlocked countries. The other one is Liechtenstein. The rivers of Armenia empty into the Caspian Sea.
In 1992, Tuckey advocated a territorial swap between Armenia and Azerbaijan; under this proposal Azerbaijan would give up the region of Nagorno-Karabakh, which would then become part of Armenia. In exchange, Armenia would hand over the southern part of the Zangezur Corridor (see the map above), thus connecting the two parts of Azerbaijan.
For many reasons, this was not accepted.
The First Nagorno-Karabakh War lasted from 1988 to 2004. This war resulted in tens of thousands of deaths on both sides and hundreds of thousands of displaced civilians.
A ceasefire went into effect in 1994. It ended most of the fighting but did not solve the problem.
A Second Nagorno-Karabakh War began in September of 2020; this brief conflict ended with an Azerbaijani victory and the signing of a Russian-brokered ceasefire agreement.
So. With all of this background, can we make sense of Derek’s newsletter?
This is how his essay begins:
Eurasianet’s Joshua Kucera reports that the Armenian and Azerbaijani governments are still at loggerheads over the proposed “Zangezur Corridor” that’s meant to link Azerbaijan proper with Nakhchivan via a road and rail network through southern Armenia:
“Depending on who you talk to, they are almost there or they are far apart,” one foreign diplomat familiar with the negotiations told Eurasianet on the condition of anonymity. “Baku says ‘we’re there, we have made all the concessions that the Armenians want, there is no question of extraterritoriality, let’s just move ahead.’ And the Armenians are saying ‘no no no, there are important issues that need to be sorted out.’”
What Azerbaijanis expect, one senior government official told Eurasianet on condition of anonymity, is a dedicated road with no entrances or exits, leading from the western edge of its mainland to the eastern edge of Nakhchivan. It would be accompanied by a railroad line and electricity transmission lines. The only security presence, the official said, should be officers from the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), the body that is specified in the 2020 agreement as being “responsible for overseeing the transport connections.” Any Armenian officers should be at least 2.5 kilometers distant on either side.
Derek goes on to write:
The Azerbaijani government insists that the corridor wouldn’t impose any territorial claims on Armenia, so fears that, e.g., it would cut Armenia off from its Iranian border are unfounded. But that restriction on the presence of Armenian personnel seems to be a sticking point for Yerevan, as Armenian officials don’t trust Azerbaijan to stick to this arrangement and no longer trust that Russian forces would be willing to enforce it. Azerbaijani leaders regard the corridor as a basic part of the agreement that ended the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh War, and at least some of the ongoing tension around Karabakh can be traced to the lack of progress in these talks.
The world is big and there are a lot of places where conflict is the norm and peace is only temporary. The Kingston Trio had it right decades ago. Interesting how so many of the lyrics still apply today.
Good grief. I would have put the Nagorno-Karabahk War somewhere in Africa. Pitiful.
Well done. Thanks! 😎