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March 19
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Armenian News – NEWS.am presents the abridged version of the article by Mary Boland published in the Irish newspaper The Irish Times:

“The blue-and-white bird-like structure of Nagorno-Karabakh’s airport perches in the Caucasus Mountains like a shining, defiant emblem of national pride. The departures screen lists an international flight to Yerevan, the Armenian capital. Members of the airport’s 120 staff stand by to pass luggage through the latest model X-ray machine. Authorities at the facility, which cost $20 million (€18 million) to rebuild, say it has sophisticated satellite navigation technology.

However, there are no passengers – and no aircraft. The flight to Yerevan is aspirational; the only way to get there remains a six-hour drive through the mountains. The reason: any flights that land at or leave this airport will come under fire from Azeri troops.

As a self-proclaimed republic recognised by no country in the world, Nagorno-Karabakh considers itself a nation under siege. The airport, destroyed in the war, reopened four years ago. “In 2011 we wanted to start flights, but our neighbours intervened – they said they would shoot down our aircraft,” says Dmitri Atbashyan, head of the statelet’s civil aviation authority.

The threats are not exaggerated. Last year three military personnel died after Azeri troops shot down their helicopter. Troops from both sides have died in sporadic clashes on the border, in breach of a 1994 Moscow-brokered ceasefire.

No UN member state recognises this enclave of some 147,000 people, despite its national flag, government, public institutions, army and police force. In the eyes of international law, it is a country that doesn’t exist.

This reality is ever present a few kilometres away in downtown Stepanakert, where the president, Bako Sahakyan, faces a lonely challenge on the international stage.

“Our primary goal is to be integrated into the civilised and international community,” says Sahakyan, a balding, ruddy man in his 50s.

The president is sitting in the boardroom of his presidential palace overlooking the significantly renamed Renaissance Square in the reconstructed capital, with its wide avenues, cafes and fashionable shops. At this comfortable distance from the front lines, it’s hard to imagine that a low-level war is unfolding.

“Of course we think we have to settle this issue with our neighbour,” he says. “We want to discuss, we want to negotiate. Unfortunately, the other side is rejecting our proposals.”

The centuries-old rivalries behind this decades-old conflict are far from resolved. This country that doesn’t exist will likely remain in limbo for some time yet.”

 

 

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