Though there had been hopes that some kind of agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan could be initialled or signed by November this year, the situation looks increasingly uncertain as Russia once again enters the fray.
Russian border guards left Yerevan’s Zvartnots Airport last week, concluding their nearly 32-year presence. The first point of contact for many citizens and tourists arriving by air in Armenia, their exact duties and numbers were never formally announced. The 1992 agreement between the Russian Federation and the Republic of Armenia instead only refers to the Border Directorate of the Federal Security Service (FSB) ensuring the protection of the border with Turkiye and Iran.
At the beginning of July, Armenian National Security Secretary Armen Grigoryan announced that talks with the United States to replace Armenia’s aging Metsamor nuclear power plant were now at a “substantive phase.” The first of two reactors at the power plant started operating in 1976, and the plant has largely met Armenia’s energy needs since. Metsamor produces 30–40 percent of Armenia’s electricity, depending on fluctuations in demand.
When Rafik Baghdasaryan died in prison in 1993, his body was transported from Russia to Armenia for burial. Baghdasaryan was part of a criminal network spanning the former Soviet Union and associates from Baku flew in to Yerevan to attend his funeral. At the time, Armenia faced a profound shortage of energy but reverence for Baghdasaryan was reportedly so profound among criminal circles in Azerbaijan that power was restored if only for the few days of the funeral. Since then, Armenia receives its gas from Russia through the North Caucasus-Transcaucasia Gas Pipeline.
This year marks the 30th anniversary of the 1994 ceasefire agreement that put fighting between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces over the Soviet-era mainly ethnic Armenian Nagorno Karabakh Autonomous Oblast (NKAO) on hold – or at least until it escalated into war in 2016 and more devastatingly in 2020. Despite the involvement of international mediators, peace remained elusive despite occasional claims to the contrary. The sides were said to have gotten close, but never enough to prevent tens of thousands dying in over three decades of conflict.
In my first piece for The Jamestown Foundation, I again look at the continuing geopolitical impasse on attempts to restore economic and transport links in the region following the 2020 Armenia-Azerbaijan war as per the trilateral ceasefire statement that ended it. This is a topic that I’ve covered consistently since the beginning of 2021 but it has particularly come to a head now as hopes for a framework agreement between Baku and Yerevan persist.
The idea was to create a win-win situation where Azerbaijan would not only connect to Nakhchivan but Armenia could potentially join the Middle Corridor transportation link from China to Europe via Central Asia and the South Caucasus, ending its semi-isolation and exclusion from regional energy and transportation projects.
Ten days ago, Transitions magazine published my latest on the European Union Mission in Armenia (EUMA). Though the monitoring mission continues to be appreciated and welcomed in the country, there still remain overly high expectations of what is a small presence along a 1,000 kilometre border with no power or ability to deter any armed incidents or skirmishes.
Indeed, on the day of publication, four Armenian and three Azerbaijani soldiers were killed near the village of Tegh.
The Caspian Post has published my article, accompanied by photographs, on the influx of alternative Russian musicians to Tbilisi following Putin’s further invasion of Ukraine last year. It’s a continuation of my work on the underground rock, metal, and punk scene in all three countries of the South Caucasus since 2001 and especially my personal project, Tbilisi Underground. The punk scene in Georgia, incidentally, has always been unique, but the arrival of often political bands from Russia and beyond has arguably diversified and reinvigorated it.