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Armenia: Review and Outlook 2023-2024

By Grigor Hakobyan

Summary:

The 2023 was marked with many missed opportunities, another act of genocide by Azerbaijani armed forces and forceful removal of the entire Armenian population from Artsakh. Specifically, despite multiple visits by high ranking Western leaders, including a large delegation from the U.S. Congress, who offered support and cooperation with Armenia in exchange for moving away from Russia, the present leadership of Armenia failed to do so, and continues to remain within Russian-led organizations such as CIS, CSTO and EEU, despite the fact that they provide very little to no gain for the Armenian national interests. Furthermore, its continued membership in Russian-led organizations limits the room for diplomatic maneuvers for Armenia and denies opportunities to acquire potent and top of the notch western weapon systems to enhance its defense capabilities against upcoming Azerbaijani military aggression that may span the entire territory of the Republic of Armenia.

Unless the political and military leaderships in Armenia make rapid changes to diversify its economy, foreign exports, develop energy independence, truly reform its military and reorient its foreign policy fully towards the West, and replace its security treaties with Russia by similar treaties with the western powers, Armenia is going to face the next war with Azerbaijani-Turkish-Russian coalition all on its own, with low chances of withstanding such an invasion. It may possibly lose its national sovereignty over much of its internationally recognized territories, if not the entire country. It is necessary to remove Russian military presence from Armenia and invite Western countries to station their bases in Armenia to prevent Azerbaijan from launching its all-out war against Armenia. The time to make rapid and significant changes is rapidly shrinking, and if any more hesitation continues, Armenia will lose its chance to avoid the resumption of war with Azerbaijan.    

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Analysis of Post-War Armenia and the Way Forward

By Grigor Hakobyan

Summary:

November 9th, 2020 was not only the end of the active stage of hostilities between Armenian and Azerbaijani-Turkish armed forces on Artsakh’s territory but also the end of Armenia’s third republic, something that the present government doesn’t appear to realize. Presently, Armenia’s government doesn’t have the same public support that it had a few years ago and symbolizes Armenia’s defeat not only on the battlefield but also in the diplomatic arena. Armenia’s present political and geopolitical situation is similar to a drowning person with hands handcuffed behind his back on his way to hit the bottom of the pool. Attempting to break the handcuffs at this point and try to swim up to the surface will do more harm than good and become the cause of his eventual drowning. The solution to the present situation is to wait until it hits the bottom and then spring up towards the surface while breaking the handcuffs in the process. To accomplish that, the Armenian people must take their future into their own hands and through grassroots efforts, rebuild Armenia from the bottom up, shaking away its upper echelons of power who no longer represent the Armenian people and pursue foreign and false agendas to the detriment of Armenian people and the security of the Armenian state. The sooner Armenian people wake up, the more time they will have to change its present trajectory leading the country and the nation to its final demise.

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Regional War or Economic Development: Challenges and Threats of the Moscow Summit

By Hrachya Arzumanian

Summary:

The summit in Moscow focused on issues of partial restoration of the region’s transport infrastructure, but not on military and political issues. The architecture of the region and the processes taking place in it are formed within the framework of two different logics: economic development and military. One can speak of the contradictory nature of the Moscow summit, when discussing the problems of economic development and infrastructure development, its participants operated with the categories of military logic. However, the formation of the future architecture of the region solely within the framework of military logic is doubtful, and the agreements reached are unstable, since they may conflict with the interests of other actors who did not participate in the summit.

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Legal Aspects of Relations Between Republics of Armenia and Artsakh: past, present and future

By Hrachya Arzumanyan

Summary: 

The ceasefire of 2020 created a number of diplomatic and political problems in relations between Artsakh and Armenia and in the international arena. The relationship between the Republics of Armenia and Artsakh remained unregulated for the post-Soviet period when the Armenian state approached the war with uncertain legal status in relations between the two republics. Winning countries having resolved the problem of Artsakh within the framework of politics and the strategy of “fait accompli” which have formulated the results of the war that were signed by Armenia’s Prime Minister creating legal, diplomatic and political collision while disfranchising the residents of Artsakh from political and jurisdiction rights. The Armenian statehood and the government need to start formulating their approach to the problem of Artsakh’s status change and its residents, and towards the future of the Artsakh conflict regulation. 

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