Armenia
War flares up Between Armenia and Azerbaijan: Does Europe need new dividing lines next to its borders?
Hostilities between Armenia and Azerbaijan have erupted again in Nagorno Karabakh after simmering for years, proving again that rolling back to the status quo of occupation and pretending to negotiate whilst maintaining the status quo is not only dangerous, it just does not work. The fighting is the heaviest seen in the region since 2016. National passions are riding high and both Armenia and Azerbaijan have blamed each other for starting the fighting.
The number of casualties is not known, but is estimated to be over 100, including civilians. According to the Office of Azerbaijan’s Attorney General a total of 35 civilians have been hospitalised with various injuries, and 12 people have been killed as of yesterday. At the time of writing the fighting appears to be spreading beyond Nagorno Karabakh, a mountainous area that is recognised as part of Azerbaijan, but which has been under Armenian occupation since the war of the early 1990s which erupted soon after the break-up of the former Soviet Union.
There is international concern that other countries may get sucked into the conflict. Russia is a major supplier of weapons to Armenia, and has a military base there. Turkey has already openly backed Azerbaijan, followed by some other countries. The EU has an important role to play. However, the voices rising from the European Union so far are not enough to contribute to a lasting solution to the conflict. In fact, the solution seems simple - as in the case of other conflicts in its neighbourhood, to support the sovereignty and territorial integrity of the occupied side, urge for withdrawal of armed forces from the occupied territories and restore peace negotiations. Otherwise, diplomatic statements which fall short of addressing the root causes of the conflict will not bring a sustainable solution to the region.
However, a number of voices from Europe over the past two days have raised more questions on the conflict than answers. The members of the European People’s Party (EPP) Political Assembly met via video-conference on 28 September and ended with a weird statement calling to “withdraw troops to the positions they had before 27 September 2020.” Such a bizarre call by the largest political party in the European Parliament has once again demonstrated how alien most European politicians are to the real political and security landscape in their neighbourhoods.
However, the main danger here is not ignorance itself, but deliberate attempts to give an ethnic and religious tone to this territorial conflict. The immature reaction of some European spokespersons, however, is reminiscent of the call for new crusades, necessitating strong opposition to these sorts of politicians who use Europe's freedom of speech and expression for hatred purposes. Even some mainstream news agencies highlighted the religious affiliation of these two confronting countries in their reports. These calls make it clear that the Armenian new “peace” concept of “new war for new territories” is purely propaganda.
This kind of destructive rhetoric from some EU politicians only provoked an immediate response from the Organization of Islamic Countries, Turkic Council, Pakistan, even Afghanistan. There are of course significant Armenian minorities in many EU member states – but the EU should resist allowing ethnic and religious colours to become implicated in this conflict. Does Europe need new dividing lines next to its borders?
If the EU wants to secure stability and peace on its frontiers, it should not stand idly by. It should be motivated to take a more proactive role in line with its international commitments and act as an honest broker to find a sustainable solution without emotion, but through an insistence to adhere to the principles of international law.
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