The events, including around and within Russia, may develop ambiguously and differently in the coming years. No one knows what state Russia will be in by the year 2025. Andrey Areshev, a Russian expert on South Caucasus issues, told about this to Armenian News-NEWS.am.

According to him, the issue of extending or not extending the Russian peacekeeping mission in Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh) will be decided at the last moment, just as the issue of their deployment there was decided.

Areshev assured that serious efforts were required to convince the leadership of Azerbaijan to agree to this Russian peacekeeping mission.

"We remember that Turkey also wanted to be fully present in Karabakh as a peacekeeper. But Russia managed to turn [Turkish president] Erdogan's desire to strengthen [Turkey] in Karabakh into an official monitoring center outside the administrative borders of the former NKAO [(Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast)].

How will this issue be resolved in 2025, given Russia's seriously increased dependence on Turkey? The commercial, economic, logistical, and other dependence [of Russia] on Turkey—the main ally, partner and, backer of Azerbaijan—has seriously increased. I believe that this will undoubtedly be taken into account in 2025. But at the moment, I don't see an alternative to the Russian peacekeeping mission in Nagorno-Karabakh," the Russian political scientist added.