Today’s ZamanLast week, in Washington, D.C., the nationwide public awareness campaign “If You See Something, Say Something” prompted me to think about our region, and what we see and how we are delivering political messages in the Caucasus.
We have seen the role played by social media in the revolutions in the Middle East and North Africa over the past year, but few of us have stopped to reflect or analyze the revolution that happened 20 years ago. We are focusing on the Middle East and North Africa (MENA)-type revolutions, ignoring the historical challenge of the 1991 revolution.
Back in 1991, few in the West had the guts or the imagination to believe that a system as brutal as that of the Soviet Union would fall. Starting in 1988, popular revolutions in the geopolitically significant zone of Eurasia, the countries of the South Caucasus, brought about independence via the crowds that gathered in the streets of Baku and Tbilisi. During this independence movement, there were no iPhones or iPads, no Twitter, no Facebook, and there was no Internet. A handful of international media outlets such as Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Voice of America along with local and international newspapers followed the independence movements in the South Caucasus countries.
Despite the principle of glasnost (“openness”), which had revolutionized the heretofore closed Soviet media, the regime reacted harshly towards independence movements in Baku and Tbilisi. When Soviet troops invaded Azerbaijan’s capital city in 1990, murdering innocent people, they first shut down the television and radio stations in order to limit access to information. Today, this measure would have much less impact than it did two decades ago, given that these days Internet technologies cover all breaking news.
A comparison between the 2011 Arab Awakening and the post-Soviet Awakening is a difficult one, but history suggests that two decades is sufficient time to calculate the impact of independence on the South Caucasus countries, and what they have achieved. This is a very important question, and one that will illuminate the future.
Twenty years after independence, the countries of the South Caucasus are still experiencing problems, among them the consequences of the violent conflicts that continue to influence internal and external political and economic developments as well as determine foreign policy priorities. Hence, the Caucasus states, with the exception of Azerbaijan, are still incapable of defending their national interests and providing for their security.
After two decades, Azerbaijan drives the development of the region. The East-West dynamic of world politics is reflected in Baku’s foreign policy as Azerbaijan is becoming a geostrategic-geo-economic hub between Asia and Europe. Current energy projects and future geostrategic plans are strengthening relations with neighboring countries like Georgia and Turkey, as well as boosting regional cooperation. The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline and the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway represent these trilateral relations. Azerbaijan is able to bring its energy resources to world markets, in addition to diversifying transport routes to increase European energy security.
The main challenge during its post-independence period has been Armenia’s occupation of Nagorno-Karabakh and the seven adjunct regions. This bloody war has brought 1 million internally displaced persons (IDPs) into Azerbaijan’s unoccupied territory, most of whom left their homes with little more than the clothes on their back -- one of the world’s great human crises. This conflict has played a significant role in shaping the mirroring national identities of Armenia and Azerbaijan.
It also continues to have a major impact on political-military and socioeconomic development in both countries, as well as across the region and beyond. Azerbaijan remains focused on finding a peaceful solution to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict -- but after two decades Armenia has not shown its readiness to accept the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan. The conflict resolution process has missed several “golden opportunities” for peace during the past two decades.
In terms of economic stability, the construction of Azerbaijan’s state system has shown the real results of Baku’s policy, as demonstrated by the “2010-2011 Global Competitiveness Report” -- in the macroeconomic stability sub-index, Azerbaijan is 16th of 142 countries. In addition, according to the 2010 UNDP Human Development Report, Azerbaijan has moved up to the category of “high human development.” Indeed, over the past five years, Azerbaijan has achieved the most rapid development of all of the 169 countries covered by the UNDP report. Additionally, Azerbaijan recently gained a non-permanent seat on the United Nation Security Council. This two-year membership marks a great diplomatic success, and will affect Baku’s foreign policy over the next decade. Through this development, Azerbaijan will have the opportunity to play a larger role in international diplomacy.
Georgia, after two decades, has managed to stabilize its economy, opening up to international investors. Like Azerbaijan, unresolved conflicts and infringements on its territorial integrity remain the main challenges to independence. Pushing for peace and prosperity, Tbilisi saw serious setbacks after the 2008 August War between Russia and Georgia. Regional cooperation has been crucial in difficult situations such as this. After the August War, Azerbaijani companies invested in the Georgian economy, which not only advanced Azerbaijan’s regional leadership, but also increased Georgia’s economic prosperity, which in turn has strengthened and intensified the relationship between these two countries and their peoples. Furthermore, political stability, economic policy and the maturity of key sectors of the economy generate conditions conducive to new geo-economic initiatives funded by both states. Azerbaijan and Georgia share an opportunity, and believe that the South Caucasus will be a place of peace and dialogue, with mutual understanding between peoples and cultures.
At the moment, Armenia stands largely separate from its two Caucasian neighbors, and being unable to develop relations with Turkey, acts more as an observer than a participant in the region’s emerging partnerships. Armenia is not only geographically landlocked, but also -- more dangerously -- politically landlocked. It seems that if Azerbaijan and Georgia are focused on the future of the region, Armenia is still preoccupied by its past. Thus, not much room is left for thinking about the present, which is, perhaps, a common trend in transitional periods.
As regional projects expand and develop, Armenia’s non-involvement increasingly limits the possibilities for its integration into the South Caucasus as a whole, which is destructive and isolating. Should the current stalemate between Baku and Yerevan continue, it may in the future be even more difficult to bridge these differences and help Armenia become a fully integrated member of the South Caucasus region.
Even today, 20 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, we need to believe that it is our challenge to find common ground, to bridge divides, to scale walls. What we most likely need is a psychological revolution -- a deep change in attitudes and thinking. Let’s “say something,” and help bring peace and prosperity to the Caucasus and beyond.
*Zaur Shiriyev is a foreign policy analyst at the Center for Strategic Studies in Baku.
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