{"id":1372,"date":"2020-12-07T15:58:36","date_gmt":"2020-12-07T15:58:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiofree.org\/?p=134610"},"modified":"2020-12-07T15:58:36","modified_gmt":"2020-12-07T15:58:36","slug":"interview-thomas-de-waal-on-whats-next-for-nagorno-karabakh-armenian-azerbaijani-relations","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2020\/12\/07\/interview-thomas-de-waal-on-whats-next-for-nagorno-karabakh-armenian-azerbaijani-relations\/","title":{"rendered":"Interview: Thomas De Waal On What’s Next For Nagorno-Karabakh, Armenian-Azerbaijani Relations"},"content":{"rendered":"
Following the latest fighting over Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan has retaken control over all seven districts around Karabakh that had been occupied by Armenian forces since the early 1990s.<\/p>\n
Azerbaijani forces also regained territory in parts of Nagorno-Karabakh itself.<\/p>\n
A Russian-brokered cease-fire deal has seen the deployment of nearly 2,000 Russian peacekeepers to ensure security in the enclave and its only overland link with Armenia — the so-called Lachin corridor through southwestern Azerbaijan.<\/p>\n
RFE\/RL Armenian Service Director Harry Tamrazian spoke on December 5 to Carnegie Europe\u2019s noted Caucasus expert Thomas de Waal about the region\u2019s prospects for diplomacy and its changing geopolitics.<\/p>\n
RFE\/RL: Since the 1990s, the Minsk Group of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) has been the mediator between Armenia and Azerbaijan in negotiations over Nagorno-Karabakh. Now, with Azerbaijan having retaken the seven districts around Nagorno-Karabakh, as well as parts of Nagorno-Karabakh itself, is the Minsk Group dead?<\/strong> Now, with Azerbaijan having retaken the seven occupied districts around Nagorno-Karabakh in recent fighting, as well as parts of Nagorno-Karabakh itself, is the Minsk Group finished? Or is there still a role for its co-chairs — the United States, France, and Russia — in order to have a meaningful impact on the process?<\/strong><\/p>\n Thomas de Waal:<\/strong> I think we’re in a completely different phase of this conflict. We have a cease-fire and truce. But we are very far from a political agreement. And the question of the status of Karabakh, I think, is even more difficult now to solve. As [far as] the Azerbaijani side is concerned, this question [of a special status for Nagorno-Karabakh] is now off the table. It is no longer up for discussion.<\/p>\n But there still need to be negotiations about the future normalization of relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan. And I suppose the Minsk Group is the only format where that is possible at the moment. That’s going to be very difficult.<\/p>\n