The European Union has decided to seriously deal with the South Caucasus. One can imagine why our three countries have been given such an “honor.” Events taking place in the Middle East, Russian, as well as those related toIrandrew the Europeans attention to our region. I don’t think that they have too many expectations from theSouth Caucasuscountries – the most the Europeans can expect is that we are predictable and comprehensible. This is the reason why 27 member-countries of the EU discussed the situation in the South Caucasus and adopted a document, the content of which will be known today.
The EU Foreign Minister Catherine Ashton, according to Radio Liberty, expressed “her deepest concern” (she said exactly so, reiterating that word twice) about what was going on inArmeniaandAzerbaijanconcerning the Karabakh issue.
The document to be adopted will probably mention the importance of letting EU officials to Nagorno-Karabakh without preconditions. What is behind that subtle diplomatic definition? The matter is that Azerbaijan claims that foreigners, in general and officials and politicians, in particular, should enter Nagorno-Karabakh only after getting their permission, otherwise, such an official can be declared persona non grata in the neighboring country. Probably the EU representatives want to annul the very precondition of getting permission.
The foreign ministers of the EU became concerned also about the upcoming parliamentary election inArmenia. Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt promised to focus on the issue of holding a free and fair election. One can deduce from this that the Europeans will assess the upcoming parliamentary election by stricter standards, than they did in 2007-2008. Particular attention will be drawn to strengthening democratic institutions, protecting human rights, the plurality of mass media and independence of the judicial system. Fields, where some progress has been made during the past four years, however the changes are slow and indecisive. They talk about fighting corruption at that level for the first time, from which one can conclude that this phenomenon has reached such a scale in our country that it has been noticed even in distantBrussels. “In this field the real progress continues remaining the foundation of economic development and prosperity,” reads the draft document to be adopted. One can also add that corruption prevents not only the economic prosperity, but also holding fair elections and why not, also the Karabakh conflict settlement. Only at first glance, there is no connection between the fact that political elites inArmeniaandAzerbaijanhave been growing rich uncontrollably and the Karabakh issue.
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However, it is a different matter.
ARAM ABRHAMYAN
