Presidents Serge Sarkisian and Ilham Aliyev
Armenian president Serge Sarkisian is set to meet his Azeri counterpart Ilham Aliyev for the sixth time this year in Munich this weekend.
Their last meeting a month ago in Moldova was considered a failure by Aliyev, and the Azeri side claimed that the Armenians were toughening their stance in finding a final resolution to the Nagorno-Karabagh conflict. Despite what may have been written in the press and vocalized by OSCE co-chairs in press conferences, little to no real progress has been made at all in the talks.
So why are they meeting again before the end of the year? The Azeri foreign minister issues statements that are never encouraging about Armenia stalling, while Aliyev still has the audacity to announce that Karabagh will be won back by force sooner or later, even under criticism from the OSCE co-chairs for doing so.
Recently information was revealed by the press suggesting that with this current peace proposal on the table, Nagorno-Karabagh would essentially return to the same status it had during the days of the Soviet Union. I find it hard to believe that the Armenian side has the intention to sign such a document after a few sticky points are resolved.
I don’t know anyone who takes these negotiations seriously. These meetings don’t seem to spark any interest amongst the general public. Former president Levon Ter-Petrossian did address the issue during is tirades in front of the “Matenadaran” national archive building, but now that he is making nice-nice with the authorities by throwing his support for the Turkish-Armenian protocols, he’s not about to hold any more rallies. Thus public discussion about the peace process seems to be hovering like a helium-filled balloon.
So what is there to talk about? What’s the point of this meeting? Does anyone really think that there will be a breakthrough this weekend?
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