A fortnight after the New Year celebrations Russia has with even greater zeal addressed the Armenia-Turkey normalization process. A distinctive feature of official Moscow’s latest initiative is their being offhand ones: Turkish Premier Recep Erdogan’s visit to Moscow and his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov’s almost simultaneous visit to Yerevan are so closely related that one can with confidence say the Kremlin has intensified its mediation in the Armenian-Turkish reconciliation.

Surprisingly, both the visits, and the RA Constitutional Court’s verdict on the constitutionality of the Armenian-Turkish protocols, have overlapped. So the Armenian side has once again shown its readiness for reconciliation with Turkey without any preconditions. The RA Constitutional Court’s verdict has proved a real stalemate for the Turkish authorities, which now have to intensify the ratification of the protocols by the Grand National Assembly. The documents were “held up” at the Foreign Relations Committee of the Turkish Parliament. Now, however, official Ankara has to think of reciprocal steps.

Noteworthy is the fact that Azerbaijan is not involved in the Russian-Armenian-Turkish contacts. The international mediators were convinced of that state’s destructive role long ago and, although certain progress in the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process is necessary for the Armenian-Turkish reconciliation, they are doing their best to put off Azerbaijan’s involvement in the present contacts.

No doubt, in a few days a high-ranking Turkish official will leave for Baku to present a regular report to the “small brother” Ilham Aliyev. Noteworthy are also Russia’s efforts – with Washington’s tacit consent – to come to terms with Ankara and Yerevan first and then to confront Azerbaijan with an accomplished fact.

Time will soon show the effectiveness of international mediators’ efforts — whether a breakthrough will come or the process will continue at a snail’s pace, which has been observed over the last few months. Considering the United States’ overwhelming desire to ensure real progress in the Armenian-Turkish process before April 24, the anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, to “justify” U.S. President Barack Obama’s going back on his election pledges that day, we should not expect any “political peace” in the region during the next few months.

T.P.