Interview with Sir Andrew Wood, British political scientist, former British Ambassador to Russia (1995 — 2000).
Q: How would you comment on the shutdown of British Council’s office throughout Russia? Do you view it as a continuation of recent cooling in British-Russian relations?
A: You were right to say that at government to government level it has been decidedly cool, including because of the murder in London of a former Russian citizen, it appears by another Russian citizen who has since become a Duma Deputy. The British Courts have also proved unwilling to implement Russian requests for the extradition of other persons, including a leading Chechen dissident, on the grounds, among others, that they do not believe that the accused would receive a fair trial in Moscow. These issues were not resolved to Moscow’s satisfaction during Foreign Secretary Miliband’s visit to Moscow earlier in 2009.
The back history of cool relations between the British and Russian governments is quite a long one. Russian actions against the British Council are part of that back history. The British Council, which is whatever some Russians choose to suspect, a completely non governmental organisation, built up its presence very considerably during the 1990s and worked effectively with a wide range of Russian organisations, both official and non-governmental, well into the first years of President Putin’s time in the Kremlin. I am quite sure that there are large numbers of Russian citizens who would welcome the return of the British Council to its work, and the acceptance on the part of the Russian authorities of what it can contribute to the intellectual enrichment of both countries as legitimate and valuable.
The wider point here of course is that the relationship between the UK and Russia goes beyond the relationship between governments — none of which, after all, last for ever. Many thousands of Russian citizens have chosen to live in the UK, to educate their children there, and to trust British authorities to deal fairly with their financial interests. British business, for its part, is heavily involved with the Russia market. Whatever our political differences, in short, the Russian and British peoples generally get on well together.
Q: There are numerous factors that deteriorate Russia’s relations with the West. Do you consider the soonest “reloading” of ties possible and what do the sides need to do to improve these relations?
A: You asked about wider Russian relations with the West. It would take a long time to analyse these in detail. One of the factors underlying what you rightly describe as their worsening has been the development within Russia of a Great Power mentality, and Moscow’s claim to a special role within the former Soviet space. Moscow points to NATO enlargement as a major issue. One can see why this is sensitive for Russia from an emotional point of view. But NATO is not configured for military action in the way it was as late as the eighties, and cannot rationally be seen as a military threat to Russia. One is left with the impression that it is the wish of formerly Soviet countries like Ukraine or Georgia to get closer to and eventually to join the Alliance that Moscow finds objectionable,or even impossible to understand. Moscow declares that it accepts that such sovereign states have the right to join whatever alliance they may wish, but Russia is nonetheless angry when they try. Russian pressure on such states of course encourages them to look elsewhere for a counter balance.
This account is inevitably a simplification. There is existing potential for benign evolution in the relationships between Russia and its fellow former Soviet states, Russian military reform will if implemented have its effect, and above all, the fact of interdependence between Russia and the West, as well as the interdependence of all the countries of the trans Atlantic area, will continue if we are wise to argue the point that we are better off together than apart. The ‘reset’ button pressed by the United States, and offered by the new NATO Secretary-General, cannot resolve all the issues that trouble Russia’s relations with the West, but they have had an effect on the atmosphere. There has been interest in the West in seeing if anything concrete can be made of the proposals for a new security architecture put forward by President Medvedev. The countries of the West have consistently supported Russian entry into the WTO, on the understanding that Russia would implement its provisions once in the organization. Russian and EU markets are tied together. The interlocking web of our interests and obligations, in brief, ties us together — and means too that this web cannot be sustained just by Russia and Western groupings like the EU of NATO, for it also includes other independent and often ex-Soviet actors as well.
Q: The former USSR countries are linked with common economic and democratic problems associated with the burden of the transitive period. How much time will be spent for Azerbaijan to be able to become a full member of the European family?
A: All I can do is to suggest some elements for an answer. The countries of the former Soviet space differ from each other, and so do the countries of the rest of the European family. All of them are in some sort of process of evolution.
But as there are constituent elements of the EU and NATO groupings perhaps we can take these as some sort of yardstick for what we might mean by the European family. Such elements would be the separation of powers, all subject to the judgment of an independent judiciary; equality of all, including the most powerful, citizens before the law; freedom of the press and freedom of speech; freedom of assembly; independently adjudicated property relations; and freedom of religion. This complex system has to be protected by freely and transparently elected governments ready to pass on to their successors the responsibility for government, secure in the knowledge that those successors will act properly to those whom they have replaced. And none of this can work without the consent and understanding support of the body of citizens as a whole.
The trouble with all these elements is that they can be replaced by dangerous imitations. Elections can be managed. The rule of law can be maintained in appearance while violated in practice. Freedoms can be abused. The best safeguards against these cancers are the commitment of the citizenry and the independence of the three main branches of government: the executive; the legislature; and the judiciary.
No country is perfect in its commitment to fully fledged democracy. The more dependent the country is on the authority of a particular personality, the less well prepared it will be for the future — and one does not have to be far sighted to note that many countries in the ex-Soviet space have in built succession problems. The conduct and outcome of the elections in Ukraine will show how ready that country will be to continue down the path of long term institution building. It is at present, or so it seems to me, encouragingly well set on constructing an effective democratic future. If that continues, it will be important to the rest of the countries of the former Soviet Union. But in the end it will be the internal dynamics of the ex-Soviet countries which will determine events, and only a fool would be ready to set a timetable for their success in approaching a general European norm. Azerbaijan has a lot going for itself in principle, and the hopes of most of its OSCE partners, for it to use in its further development.
Q: Due to the relative passiveness of the West, Russia is almost the only influential mediator in the Karabakh settlement. Do you think it may settle this conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia alone or there is a need for Europe’s and US participation in the peacekeeping process?
A: Of course the Nagorno-Karabakh issue is a major obstacle. You asked if Russia could act with effect as the sole effective intermediary in the face of what you saw as the relative passivity of the West, or whether the latter should make more effort. I would not claim to be an expert in this area, though I have visited the graves of the dead in Baku, and learned enough of what passed to have a feel for the pain in Azerbaijan behind this question. My understanding of the pain in Armenia is less direct, but it is there nonetheless. So I hope that you will forgive me if I say that it is up to the two governments principally involved to look for a settlement, and to take responsibility for it, and that if Baku and Erevan cannot do this, then there will be no settlement until they do. Intermediaries can help once that condition is there — but until it is, their presence and efforts all too often give cover for the parties in dispute to take maximalist positions which may play well at home but prolong the underlying conflict. There are plenty of examples of conflicts lasting for decades despite the earnest efforts of well meaning outsiders to resolve them.
Q: What do you think are the prospects of the soonest resolution of the Karabakh conflict? Do you share the view that it can be attained quicker than the resolution of other conflicts in the post-Soviet area including in Georgia and Moldova?
A: I am not close enough to the Nagorno-Karabakh issue to begin to guess whether it may be resolved before the questions of restoring the territorial integrity of Moldova or Georgia. But there have been some changes in the context, not all of them welcome to Baku — or Erevan for that matter — which could at least affect the outcome. If Moscow can encourage that process, that would surely be welcome. I do not think it aims to do that alone, and the wider context includes others too. An equitable and lasting settlement would be in the interests of the international community as a whole. And the sooner the better, including for both Baku and Erevan.
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