Grassroots and Football Diplomacy

​​As usual, much more progress has been made on the ground than up above. On the ground – that's the market in Vanadzor. And up above is politics. Vanadzor is located in the northern part of Armenia, near the border with Georgia, one of Armenia's few friends, but also close to the borders with Azerbaijan and Turkey. The latter are Armenia's archenemies, and the borders with these countries are therefore closed.

At the same time, 80 per cent of all the goods sold in Vanadzor – bridal wear, linens, bathroom fixtures – come from Turkey, which does not officially recognise the genocide perpetrated by the Ottomans against the Armenians. Most of the other goods come from Azerbaijan, with which Armenia is mired in a dispute over the Armenian enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Change through trade?

How is it possible to have trade relations with a political adversary? Quite easily, it seems. At any rate, Anushavan Martirosyan looks very relaxed sitting before his stand displaying jeans and undergarments from Turkey. Five to six times a year he takes the bus via Georgia to Istanbul, he says, where the merchandise is cheaper than European textiles and of better quality than the stuff produced in China. Doesn't he have any moral scruples, seeing as Istanbul refuses even to speak about the genocide? "Turkey will acknowledge it one day", he says.

​​An even touchier subject is trade with Azerbaijan: an entrepreneur from Vanadzor who asked that his name not be published needs bitumen from Baku to build roads. But the government there forbids any official contact. If anyone were to spy the bitumen containers on enemy territory, the Azerbaijani salespeople would be in big trouble. So the road-builder transports the material to Georgia first, where a middleman purchases it and sells it to the Armenians, reloading it and bringing it across the border.

Trade with Azerbaijan? Where 30,000 people lost their lives in the war over Karabakh? The war was a long time ago, says the dealer: We lived with the Azerbaijanis before, why should we be enemies now?

Vanadzor's mayor, Samvel Darbinyan, has even put himself at the helm of an ambitious grassroots project, Eurokawkas, a cooperation between municipalities in the four neighbouring countries for projects in tourism, trade and sport, based on the EUREGIO model. Most of it is still in the idea stage, but the interest is just as great as the expectations. "First we improve interpersonal relations, then we solve the political problems", says Darbinyan: "People want to finally lead normal lives."

One step forward, two steps back

He and his colleagues in the four-country region are going to have to demonstrate plenty of staying power, because Armenia's conflicts are some of the most intractable in the Caucasus. One step forward is followed by two steps back – today as always. Supported by Swiss facilitators, Armenia and Turkey signed two protocols for the opening of their mutual borders in October 2009. This was the high point in a months-long process of "football diplomacy" for which the heads of state of both countries met at the stadium in the Armenian capital of Yerevan and in Bursa, Turkey.

​​Not even six months later, though, the process came to a halt: in April, Armenia's President Serzh Sargsyan refused to ratify the agreement after Turkey had declared, swayed by pressure from Azerbaijan, that there was one issue that would have to be resolved first, one not mentioned in the protocols: Karabakh.

In the meantime Sargsyan is pessimistic: "If Turkey makes the resolution of the Karabakh conflict a precondition, how can we expect any positive steps? In that case we can just withdraw our signatures from the agreement until the question is resolved", he commented.

It's true that Armenia has never recognised the self-proclaimed Republic of Karabakh, but the area is dependent both militarily and economically on Yerevan and the financial strength of its diaspora. Only a referendum can decide the future of the Armenian enclave, says Sargsyan: "Why are such issues resolved through a referendum in Europe, but we have to decide them with a machine gun?" Only then would Armenia give back the Azerbaijani territories it occupies outside of Karabakh.

High price of the conflict

Sargsyan insists that Armenia will not let itself be economically blackmailed. But the price of the conflict is high. The military is expensive. And the necessity of transporting goods through Georgia squanders vast sums of money and fosters the oligarchy. The economy has shrunk by 14 per cent due to the crisis.

​​Sargsyan now plans to court German investors. But who wants to invest in a country with half of its borders closed? Opponents, particularly in the diaspora, accuse Sargsyan of selling out national interests. And his greatest nemesis, his pre-predecessor Levon Ter-Petrossian, is voicing criticism in Yerevan that Sargsyan is trying to curry favour with the international community in order to distract attention from his questionable legitimacy: "The world community is closing its eyes to the fact that there are political prisoners here and demonstrations are prohibited."

Leniency towards the West

Armenian observers presume that Yerevan is continuing to conduct negotiations with Turkey. This would also benefit the USA, which has great hopes for Armenia – no other president has been received in Washington as frequently as Sargsyan.

An opening of the borders would reduce Armenia's dependence on Russia. Moreover, Yerevan's strategic significance grows greater the more likely a US clash with Armenian neighbour state Iran becomes.

Armenia is looking toward the West. Although Yerevan has never aspired to membership in the EU, Armenia is nonetheless part of the new EU Association Agreement known as the Eastern Partnership. And it is trying to get closer to NATO: for the last few months 40 Armenian soldiers have been fighting in the German contingent in Afghanistan. Perhaps more will soon join them? Sargsyan is hesitant. The majority of his troops are tied up at the moment – in Karabakh.

Sonja Zekri

© Süddeutsche Zeitung/Qantara.de 2010

Translated from the German by Jennifer Taylor

Editor: Lewis Gropp/Qantara.de

Qantara.de

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