Nagorno-Karabakh: Iran Among the many Entangled

By: Salman Rafi Sheikh

Flaring tensions within the Southern Caucasian area are drawing in competing geopolitical pursuits together with not simply the Armenians and Azerbaijanis, who’ve been slugging it out within the Nagorno-Karabakh area, however a Russia weakened by its invasion of Ukraine, in addition to Turkey, Iran, and inevitably the US-led NATO. 

Because the world is aware of, the affair has culminated within the mass flight of as many as 120,000 terrified Armenians from the area with not more than what they might carry with them in one of many largest bursts of ethnic cleaning in current reminiscence. Greater than 80 p.c of the area’s inhabitants is fleeing. Total cities have emptied out, leaving the accumulations of lifetimes scattered in streets now occupied by stray animals. Vehicles caught in departure visitors jams have been left abandoned within the streets. The refugees’ fears usually are not unfounded. The Armenian Genocide by the Ottomans in 1915-16 led multitudes of them to flee to the Nagorno-Karabakh area within the first place.
In 1918, Armenians and Azerbaijanians clashed once more in Baku. In 1920, pogroms within the metropolis of Shusha in Nagorno-Karabakh claimed the lives of greater than 30,000 Armenians. Within the following many years, the area remained disputed till it misplaced its standing to the Soviet Union’s consolidation. Following the Soviet Union’s dissolution, each Armenia and Azerbaijan laid claims to it and fought the primary Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, resulting in a ceasefire settlement in 1994 that consolidated the area however didn’t resolve the dispute.

Ever since 1991, the area has been led by ethnic Armenians, however in 2020, Azerbaijan and Armenia once more fought a bloody battle that led to the previous, backed by Turkey, to reclaim among the disputed territory. Whereas the 2020 conflict was delivered to a halt through a Moscow-brokered ceasefire settlement, this time Russia, which theoretically acts as a guarantor of Armenian safety, is nowhere to be seen due primarily to its preoccupation with the army battle in Ukraine. As well as, Moscow just isn’t pleased with Armenia’s present prime minister, whom it deems to be too pro-Western.

As a substitute, Moscow’s absence plus the truth that Iran has essential pursuits to guard amid its long-standing rivalry with Azerbaijan (and Turkey), has introduced Tehran to the entrance of the battle. Iran is Russia’s ally and each help Armenia in opposition to Azerbaijan, which is proving to be the important thing side of contemporary geopolitical tensions, as Iran sees Azerbaijan’s management of the Nagorno-Karabakh as solely a step in the direction of claiming one other strip of land in southern Armenia.

Azerbaijan’s exclave of Nakhichevan – which borders Turkey however is separated from mainland Azerbaijan by the Armenian territory – is a Soviet-era territorial anomaly that Baku desires to reset with assist from Ankara to ascertain the Zangger hall that may not solely territorially unify Azerbaijan however would additionally join it with Turkey and Israel – a rustic that Baku despatched its first ever ambassador to in March 2023 in an anticipation of such a improvement.

The hall additionally lies in a area that had a considerable Azerbaijani inhabitants up till the early twentieth century. Azerbaijan’s official narrative blames the Soviet Union and Armenia for displacing the ‘authentic’ inhabitants, putting in a historic justification for retaking the misplaced land. If the land is annexed, Armenia will lose. However, along with Armenia itself, Tehran, too, stands to lose from this doable land hall and the politics surrounding it.

This is able to, for Iran, convey Azerbaijan and Turkey in very shut proximity to Iran’s north, the place Turkic and Azerbaijan minorities are primarily based. Nearly one-third of the Iranian inhabitants is of Azerbaijanian origin, which is why Tehran has been accusing Azerbaijan for a really very long time of inciting separatism. Plus, if Azerbaijan finally ends up securing this piece of land, Iran will lose its border reference to Armenia, making bilateral commerce – which is at the moment greater than US$700 million yearly and is predicted to achieve US$3 billion sooner or later – dependent upon Azerbaijan.

Presently, Azerbaijan depends on Iran to achieve its exclave. Nonetheless, if Azerbaijan succeeds in establishing the brand new hall, Tehran may even lose its leverage on Azerbaijan. To date, this issue has performed an essential position within the calculations of the management in Baku and is a robust motivator to forestall a continuation or worsening of tensions with Tehran. But when this had been to vary, Iran suspects Baku to grow to be much more concerned with Iran’s Azerbaijanian inhabitants to entice them in opposition to Tehran.

Iran, due to this fact, has been resisting such prospects. In October 2022, the Iranian President warned Azerbaijan’s chief that “any change in historic borders, regional geopolitics, and Iran-Armenia transit routes just isn’t tolerable.”

However the warning has had no impact, as Azerbaijan, with help from Turkey, continued to pursue its targets to ascertain the hall. Iran needed to reply. In December 2022, Iran retaliated by opening a brand-new consulate within the city of Kapan, the capital of Armenia’s Syunik province that Azerbaijan desires to regulate to ascertain the land hall. The consulate has clear army and intelligence functions. Actually, Tehran took steps to make it clear when, solely days earlier than the opening, it performed huge conflict video games on Iran’s border with Azerbaijan.

In response to Iranian Brig. Gen. Mohammad Pakpour, the drills had been designed to ship a message of “peace and friendship” to nations within the area, whereas demonstrating their means to “reply decisively to any risk.” However the truth is, the Azerbaijan army’s triumph most likely will increase the potential for escalation right into a wider battle with Armenia. It additionally alerts the failure of Western diplomatic efforts to resolve the territorial dispute. Actually, following the drill, the Azerbaijanian embassy noticed itself getting attacked in Tehran, main Baku to droop its embassy’s operation and blaming Tehran for the incident.

Though Iran denied its involvement, this was solely a prelude to what began to occur in late September. After taking up the Nagorno-Karabakh area, Azerbaijan’s president met Turkey’s Erdogan on September 25 and mentioned the politics of the hall. In a symbolic transfer, Erdogan flew to Azerbaijan’s Nakhichevan exclave, which is on the coronary heart of recent tensions involving Armenia and Iran vis-à-vis Turkey and Azerbaijan.

The presence of Erdogan, for Iran, additionally means the presence of the US-led NATO within the area. Within the current context framed by the Russia-Ukraine battle and the heightened position of NATO in regional geopolitics, Turkey’s growth additionally means NATO’s growth, which issues not solely Iran however Russia as effectively.

Due to this fact, Iran’s resistance and growth in Armenia are very intently tied to Tehran’s deep cooperation with Russia, which extends to Russia’s ongoing marketing campaign to swallow Ukraine as effectively, which NATO, led by the US, is doing its finest to cease. To increase this cooperation, the Russian protection minister arrived in Tehran within the third week of September to develop a coordinated coverage vis-à-vis the disaster to forestall it from turning an excessive amount of to their drawback, anticipating that Azerbaijan’s current success is just the start of extra battle to observe – a state of affairs that extra-regional powers can be keen to use.

Dr. Salman Rafi Sheikh is a Pakistan-based educational and an everyday contributor to Asia Sentinel