The platform of stability in the Caucasus in a tangle of contradictions

Presidents Ilham Aliyev and Recep Tayyip have sent a message to Yerevan inviting to peaceful cooperation and threw a touchstone towards reviving the idea of ​​a "Platform for Stability and Cooperation in the Caucasus" put forward in 2008.

"All the countries of the region participating in this platform will only benefit. There is a traditional Turkish-Azerbaijani-Georgian cooperation; there is Azerbaijan-Russia-Iran cooperation; and there is a Turkey-Russia-Iran cooperation. We can generalize all these platforms, uniting them into a single one. Armenia will draw the right conclusions from the war, renounce its unfounded claims and look into the future; they can take their place on this platform. We are open for this," Aliyev said.

“The respected President of Russia Vladimir Putin also supported this (platform - Turan). Russia, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Iran, Georgia and Armenia, only if it supports, can also be included in this cooperation platform. Thus, we can achieve regional reconciliation with this platform,” Erdogan said.

It is somewhat symbolic that Erdogan voiced this idea for the second time in the past 12 years and again in the post-war situation. For the first time, he put forward the idea of ​​a "Platform for Stability and Cooperation in the Caucasus" immediately after the Russian-Georgian war in August 2008. The platform envisioned cooperation between Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Russia and Turkey in the "five" or "3 + 2" format. Later, Erdogan said that the UN should also take part in the negotiations.

Erdogan discussed the initiative with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on August 11, 2008 during his visit to Moscow. After Moscow, the initiative was discussed in Baku and Tbilisi, where it was approved.

On February 13, 2009, at a press conference following the Russian-Turkish summit talks, Medvedev said: "We see the possibility of its (platform - Turan) implementation and the opportunity to conduct a denser, sometimes informal dialogue, to contribute to the solution of economic, transport, energy problems of the region."

However, he made a reservation: "We are able to cope with such problems on our own, without the participation of extra-regional powers." This position cut off the West, which had strategic interests in the region, from participation in the initiative, which made the platform ineffective. Subsequently, this initiative was not in demand due to the conflict of interests of the countries of the region and third states. Russia viewed the Caucasus as its fiefdom and did not want Turkey to enter the region. Iran, as a historical rival of Turkey, was also not interested in the Turkish presence, and especially in the pro-Turkish border Azerbaijan. Armenia, which occupied the Azerbaijani lands and which was striving for the independence of the NKR, could not allow the strengthening of the historical enemy (Turkey) in the Caucasus, threatening its plans to expand its territories. Erdogan's only allies in this matter were Azerbaijan and Georgia, who want to restore territorial integrity and take advantage of stability to create a full-fledged multipurpose transport and energy corridor Caspian Sea-Europe.

The idea of ​​creating a stability platform is not new. Patriarchs of politics - first Eduard Shevardnaze in 1999 put forward the idea of ​​"For a Peaceful Caucasus", and then the Turkish President Suleiman Demirel with the "Stability Pact in the Caucasus", Azerbaijani President Heydar Aliyev and Armenian President Robert Kocharian supported it. However, these initiatives, unfortunately, remained in the form of a testament to future successors due to the clash of the same interests, which were mentioned above.

The United States and the European Union greeted these initiatives with coolness at the turn of the 21st century and in 2008, as they set the task of pushing the three regional powers out of the South Caucasus, which corresponded to their interests in penetrating the region and drawing the South Caucasus into the western sphere of influence. This was seen in the implementation of various platforms at the level of the Council of Europe, European Union, OSCE and NATO - like "Wider Europe - New Neighbors", "Partnership for Peace". However, it was not one-sided, but a counter-movement - the South Caucasian countries, despite their internal contradictions, built a policy of integration with the Western Hemisphere.

Armenia's reaction to the current initiative of the presidents of Turkey and Azerbaijan was predictable in the context of the just-ended war, when the sides are still exchanging militant, denunciatory statements.

"Aliyev's assertions that Azerbaijan solved the Karabakh problem by military means shows again who is the initiator of the war and the use of force and who is trying to lead the region along the path of further destabilization and testing," said Prime Minister's Press Secretary Mane Gevorgyan.

The rest countries of the region did not comment on the initiative in any way, even Russia. Although Erdogan mentioned in Baku that he received the support of President Putin. The initiative was announced on November 10, and it may be too early to make inputs that it went unnoticed after a short time or the presence of opposing interests.

However, despite the established Turkish-Russian compromise in Azerbaijan, the defeat of Armenia, which led it to rethink the idea of peaceful coexistence, problems still, remain. Iran, as before, is not interested in Turkey’s strengthening. The European Union imposed sanctions on Turkey for its confrontation with Greece in the Mediterranean, and previously condemned for supporting Azerbaijan in the second Karabakh war. The United States, waging a sanctions war with two possible participants in the project: Russia and Iran can thus also become potential opponents of such an alliance. We see in this issue a clash of two vectors of the worldview and interests of the West and the East. Without their compromise combination, the idea of ​​the Platform for Stability in the Caucasus can be transferred to the next generation of politicians.