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A Handshake Shakes A Region

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  • A Handshake Shakes A Region

    A HANDSHAKE SHAKES A REGION

    Christian Science Monitor
    http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0519/p08s01-comv.ht ml
    May 19 2009

    Turkey's warming with Armenia stirs up ethnic and energy issues in
    the strategic Caucasus.

    Make one move in the unstable Caucasus region, and a host of difficult
    and far-reaching issues get tripped over - ethnic tensions, Russian
    dominance, and competition over oil and gas.

    So the world discovered when Russia's military clashed with tiny
    Georgia's last August. And so it's discovering again under far more
    welcome circumstances: a long-awaited warming between Turkey and its
    Caucasus neighbor, Armenia.

    Yes, even such rapprochement can stir up this region, sandwiched
    between the Black and Caspian seas and bordered by Russia to the
    north and Turkey and Iran to the south.

    Over the past few weeks, energy-rich Azerbaijan has turned up the
    flame under this geographic cauldron. It was furious with Turkey for
    agreeing in April to a "road map" to normal relations with Armenia,
    which backs a separatist Armenian enclave within Azerbaijan called
    Nagorno-Karabakh. The area was the site of a bloody war in the early
    1990s after the Soviet empire broke up, and has since become the oldest
    "frozen conflict" in the south Caucasus. Armenia-supported separatists
    hold additional Azeri territory outside the enclave.

    So Azerbaijan has used the only leverage it has - oil and gas - to
    influence Turkey. It's an influence that extends even to European
    energy goals.

    Situated on the western coast of the Caspian Sea, Azerbaijan serves as
    a gateway to the sea region's fossil fuels. It funnels oil to Western
    countries via a pipeline that avoids Russia and winds through Georgia
    to the Turkish Mediterranean coast. It also exports gas via a pipeline
    that ends in Turkey.

    Azerbaijan expects to significantly increase gas exports in another
    five to seven years and has been counting on extending gas pipeline
    delivery to Western European markets. Similarly, Europe has been
    looking forward to an extended pipeline - particularly a planned one
    from Turkey to Austria - to give it more energy independence from
    Russia. But that east-west line - called Nabucco - has a history
    of delays.

    Unless the Turks make resolving Nagorno-Karabakh part of normalizing
    ties with Armenia (and Armenia objects to this), the longer gas
    pipeline will end as a pipe dream - or so the Azeris hinted. They
    threatened to withdraw Turkey's status as "most favored customer"
    and as the main Azeri export route for oil and gas. There's Russia
    as an alternative, the Azeris warned.

    Azerbaijan has a self-interest in a diversified export energy
    market, but its overture to Russia is more than bluff. The Azeris and
    Russians recently signed a memo of understanding about gas sales. The
    concern is that this could go further and that Azerbaijan, fed up
    with delays over a gas pipeline to Europe, would make Russia its gas
    patron. Because supplies are not enough to support two gas pipelines,
    European governments are now pushing to realize their dream of a gas
    line that reaches them.

    If Russia eventually gets the gas deal, it not only locks in energy
    supplies, it also solidifies its leverage over the Caucasus - already
    enhanced by its occupation of Georgia's two breakaway republics.

    Multiple fears are at work in the Caucasus: at the local level about
    the preservation of ethnic culture, at the national level about
    territorial integrity, and at the international level about regional
    influence and access to energy markets.

    This calls for a sophisticated approach that seeks to build trust
    in all these areas. Earlier this month, international mediators
    for Nagorno-Karabakh quietly brought the presidents of Armenia and
    Azerbaijan together to talk on the sidelines of a conference in
    Prague. In June, the two presidents are expected to meet again in
    Russia. These are positive steps.

    Last week, Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited
    Azerbaijan and Russia to try to reduce the simmering ethnic and energy
    tensions in the region. He made progress with Russian Prime Minister
    Vladimir Putin on a new north-south Russian-Turkish gas pipeline
    that would supply Israel and other countries. That, plus renewing
    a contract for Russian gas supplies to Turkey, should help reassure
    Moscow of its continued energy influence.

    But when Mr. Erdogan, on his visit to Azerbaijan, gave in to the demand
    that Turkey not reopen its borders with Armenia until Nagorno-Karabakh
    is resolved, he reignited flames in Armenia. Some speculate that the
    normalization process is now at risk.

    This region is too small, the stakes too high, to separate politics
    from energy. Both will have to be handled at the same time, if perhaps
    on different tracks.
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