Moving on was never going to be easy, both countries recognized the need to do so and engaged in a process of rapprochement which culminated in the signing of two protocols to restore diplomatic relations and the reopening of the border in Switzerland in October 2009. To outsiders it looked like the start of a reconciliation that would bring decades of hostility to an end and increase stability in a region which has been plagued by troubles for most of the last century. However, no sooner did the sun come out than the sky clouded over again and the rapprochement is in grave danger of failing unless some way can he found to nudge the two neighbors back onto the right track. Derailment of the process could well leave Turkey and Armenia in a worse situation than before.The decision of the Armenian Constitutional Court in January to support the protocols on the grounds that they are consistent with the founding principles of the state, which commit Armenia to pursue the recognition of the 1915 killings as genocide, was objected to by the Turkish Foreign Ministry. Given that the court’s endorsement cleared the path for the protocols to be ratified by the Armenian parliament, there can be no doubt that Turkey has used the Armenian ruling as an excuse not to move forward -- given it has put itself into a corner with neighbor Azerbaijan.
Turkey’s backtracking damages its credibility with the international community and calls Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu’s “zero problems with neighbors” strategy into question. Surely Turkey’s leadership must have realized at the beginning of this process that the road to normalization would be paved with difficulties. They clearly did not think out their “strategy” properly as it is obvious the government underestimated the fervor of the opposition the issue generated both in Turkey and in Azerbaijan.
It seems that Turkey rather naively pinned everything on progress being made on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, hoping that a breakthrough would occur which would allow Ankara to ratify the protocols and open the border without upsetting Baku or Azerbaijan’s allies and friends in Turkey. Not surprisingly this breakthrough has failed to materialize. The search for a solution to Nagorno-Karabakh has been under way for years so it was highly unlikely that such a miraculous breakthrough would happen overnight.
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan now finds himself boxed in as he continues to state that Turkey will not ratify until Armenia withdraws from the occupied territories of Azerbaijan. For Armenian President Serzh Sarksyan to make this sort of huge concession on Nagorno-Karabakh would be political suicide. Turkey now finds itself somewhat hostage to Azerbaijan.
Turkey closed the border in the first place in consolidation with Baku, which has expressed great discontent at the idea of the border being reopened without any movement on Nagorno-Karabakh. Azerbaijan is using its gas card as leverage on Turkey. Ongoing negotiations between Ankara and Baku over new prices for gas and transit (which are also in part crucial for the long-planned Nabucco gas pipeline) have now become entwined with Turkey’s rapprochement with Armenia. However, Azerbaijan needs to be careful it does not shoot itself in the foot. Turkey is Azerbaijan’s only reliable and friendly neighbor. Increasingly isolating itself in a hostile neighborhood, or threatening to sell all its gas to the Russian’s and “others,” does not serve any useful purpose.
However, at the same time it is not unreasonable for Armenia to make some other sort of gesture to help ease the current stalemate which would be of benefit to all three countries. Well-known Caucasus expert Thomas de Waal recently suggested that a way do this could be for Armenia to ease the blockade of Nakhchivan, an Azerbaijani territory which is separated from the rest of Azerbaijan by Armenia. He proposes that in parallel with the opening of the Armenian-Turkish border the Armenians could begin work on rehabilitating the long-defunct railway line that once connected Azerbaijan, Armenia, Nakhchivan and Turkey. Such an initiative from Yerevan should be welcome by Ankara and help them move on with ratifying the protocols even if Baku were to continue with its protests.
Allowing these protocols to remain in a desk drawer forever would be a terrible tragedy -- not just for Turkey and Armenia but for the entire region. Turkey’s ambitious foreign policy, with its goal of becoming the key power in its region, would face a serious setback and, with a fresh Armenian genocide resolution to be taken up by a US congressional panel early next month, throw Turkey’s relationship with the US into jeopardy. Turkey and Armenia need to finish what they started. They need to take new brave steps and they need to take them now.
