By Ivan Gharibyan

The OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs are completing their regional visit, which has proved to be the “poorest” both in interesting public statements and in the traditional information leakage. One gets the impression that the aim of the visit was informing the Armenian, Azerbaijani and Nagorno-Karabakh public of the lack of connection between the Armenia-Turkey normalization and Nagorno-Karabakh peace processes, rather than preparing an Armenian-Azerbaijani presidential meeting in Kishinev, Moldova.

The Kishinev meeting scheduled for October 8 is surrounded by an interesting aura, making one to seek for new implications of the international mediators’ official statements and actions. Their assurances that the Sagsyan-Aliev meeting will not result in any document being signed is evidence of their eagerly seeking to rule out any obstacles to the normalization of the Armenian-Turkish relations at the crucial moment and save the Armenian authorities from one more “headache” — they are being criticized for their new foreign policy as it is. The recently appointed U.S. Chairman of the OSCE Minsk Group Robert Bradtke dodged the question by pointing out some progress in the negotiations and expressing hope for greater progress at the Chisinau meeting.

What may the long-awaited progress mean? A joint statement on the necessity for revising the Madrid Principles by the Russian, French and U.S. Presidents made it obvious that the OSCE MG Co-Chairs can only progress in this direction. Moreover, an interview given to NEWS.am by Russian Co-Chair of the OSCE Minsk Group Yuri Merzlyakov suggests that the revised Madrid Principles are ready, but will be submitted to the Presidents at the “right moment,” rather than at their meeting in Chisinau. At this point there emerges a question: with the negotiations exclusively progressing to the final agreement on a number of points of the Madrid Principles, what is the purpose of the President’s meeting on October 8, if, according to Merzlyakov, the revised Madrid Principles will not be submitted to them? It is purely logical that the purpose of the Chisinau meeting is to ascertain the Armenian and Azeri leaders’ attitude to the revised Madrid Principles, which is impossible without the documents being submitted to the Presidents.

Considering the Azerbaijani authorities’ “talent” for torpedoing the negotiations for the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh process by setting impracticable terms to the Armenian side at the crucial moment, the international mediators decided to neutralize the inevitable effect of the overlapping terms on the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process. This can account for the mediators’ refusal to speed up the process to prevent any detriment to the other, as American strategists designated it, “parallel” Armenia-Turkey normalization process, which, in turn, is supposed to have a positive effect on the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process.