Are experts helping to resolve the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan? – Mikayel Zolyan & Shahin Hajiyev

Experts and political analysts have played and continue to play an important role in facilitating understanding of the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict. Although the media and other public platforms are full of reports and opinions which distort the facts, political analysis nevertheless has an influence, directly or indirectly shaping public opinion and even the course of the negotiation process.

During a discussion on the CivilNet channel, organised as part of a joint initiative by the Yerevan and Baku Press Clubs, political analyst Mikayel Zolyan and editor of the Turan news agency Shahin Hajiyev discussed the influence of the expert community on the conflict resolution process between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

Before and after the 44-day war

Shahin Hajiyev noticed how the character and influence of expert analysis changed before and after the Karabakh war of 2020: “During the period before the war expert opinions involved analysis and attempts to anticipate developments and provide recommendations. This changed after the war. The leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan started to work directly together – instead of talking about how to solve the problem they started to engage in concrete negotiations. The role of experts and analysts then became more about reiterating the positions of the two countries’ leaders.”

In terms of understanding the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Mikayel Zolyan believes that experts can be important players, provided they stay within the bounds of professional ethics. “People need someone who can provide a clear explanation of what’s happening in the conflict. Experts and political analysts fulfil this function”, Zolyan observed, while also noting that prognoses and recommendations from the expert community can have their limitations. He also urged people not to expect analysts to provide precise prognoses or the exact formula to resolve the issue. In his opinion experts describe potential scenarios for how the situation might evolve but they can’t predict which of these will be implemented in practice by the politicians because it depends on multiple factors.

Unpopular solutions from experts

In addition, as well as scrutinising the negotiation process, experts and analysts provide an important channel for assessing public opinion on various sensitive topics. There is a reason why politicians and diplomats involved in the negotiations meet experts to explain their actions and motives in the process. They see it as a way to communicate their approaches to resolving the conflict to a wider audience.

In this regard Shahin Hajiyev also emphasised the importance of experts in promoting solutions which may not be entirely popular, and are alternatives to official and mainstream discourse. He cited the example of what he viewed as the ‘revolutionary’ idea of Armenian political analyst, Areg Kochinyan, who suggested that Armenia should be incorporated into the Turkic countries’ system of security and economic relations.

“He also proposed a formula for resolving the issues around the Zangezur corridor. According to him, it doesn’t make sense to become fixated on the idea that it would violate the rights of the Armenians or Armenia [in this case its sovereignty – ed.], because Yerevan could counter this by requesting access to the Black Sea through Turkish territory on exactly the same basis.” Shahin Hajiyev highlighted this example from Kochinyan, as he said it showed how discussions about the conflict can lead to the emergence of “rational ideas that can become the subject for dialogue”.

Meanwhile, it should be noted that the Armenian leadership is not even considering this idea because it would mean Turkey’s official involvement in the Armenian-Azerbaijani peace process which Yerevan would view as undesirable. Armenia sees it as two different processes, even though they have a significant influence on each other.

Turan editor Shahin Hajiyev said that discussing ways to resolve the conflict and promoting new, more creative approaches is much more effective than sabre rattling and militarised rhetoric. “This is not a political science discussion, it’s a conversation between housewives. People who have taken on responsibility for talking about the problems of the state should be looking for ways to solve them. And it shouldn’t be about ‘hoorah patriotism’ or a desire to please the government so that you get to appear on TV more frequently”, he stressed.

Mikayel Zolyan agreed with this point of view, saying that the role of experts is to put forward ‘unpopular ideas’, even if they are inconsistent with the fundamental narratives proposed by the government or the political opposition. This is very relevant in Armenia where the polarisation of political discourse, especially since the country’s defeat in the war of 2020, remains one of the main issues domestically. With the dominance in the public sphere of polarised discourse where everything is black or white, it is becoming very difficult to vocalise positions that diverge from the official line or prevailing public opinion.

“Experts and political analysts are in a better position to talk about creative approaches that can help with understanding the situation, because this acts as a sort of stimulus for reflection in the search for solutions”, said Mikayel Zolyan. However, he noted that Armenian and Azerbaijani experts don’t make the most of the opportunities they have in this respect, because they’re concerned about the information war that is part of this conflict and about becoming the target of political attacks from both sides.

“It’s always possible that some blog or site on the other side will take your comments out of context and use them against you or your country. It’s something you can’t ignore. It’s especially true in the case of Armenia, where there’s essentially an information war going on within the country itself”, explained Zolyan. He went on to say that in these circumstances even professional political scientists find it difficult to disengage themselves from the emotions around them and to take a more detached bird’s eye view of the situation.

In addition, the lack of detail available about the negotiations is also an obstacle for experts in their quest for solutions. “There isn’t a great deal of information because the further you are from the negotiations, the less you know about what’s happening. There’s a Chinese proverb that sums it up well – those who know don’t speak and those who speak don’t know”, said Zolyan.

The manipulation factor

The participants in the CivilNet dialogue also talked about the manipulation factor in relation to public opinion, which hinders understanding of the realities of a peace settlement. Fake news stories, the sources of which can be difficult to identify, sometimes lead to such bitter debates and panic that the bodies responsible have to go to great lengths to first stop the spread of disinformation and then to calm the passions that have been aroused. Often, even once such manipulative influences have been successfully countered, a negative residue remains in the public consciousness.

To ensure a rapid response to manipulation and propaganda and attempts to spread disinformation, the experts highlighted the importance of the governments developing an effective system of strategic communication.

“Armenia, in particular, encountered this after the war in 2020 when trust in official sources of information was pretty low. One of the impacts of the war was a dramatic decline in trust in the state and state sources of information”, said Mikayel Zolyan, noting that three years later the situation has evened out somewhat. “Partly due to fatigue with these issues and partly as a result of increased media literacy among the public”, he explained.

Disinformation is also a factor in Azerbaijan, according to Shahin Hajiyev. “It’s a phenomenon that gets in the way. It’s no coincidence that during the military operations internet access was restricted in Azerbaijan and some social media such as TikTok was blocked. People drew conclusions.”

Is analysis by foreign experts useful?

The conversation between the two invited experts also touched on the question of whether useful contributions could be made by experts from abroad with knowledge about the issues. Such experts have a different perspective on the region because they are watching the conflict resolution process between Armenia and Azerbaijan from the sidelines. “There are really good specialists abroad who are very knowledgeable about our region, but there aren’t many of them and not all of them speak publicly”, said Zolyan.

He also stressed that the importance of foreign experts shouldn’t be overestimated, otherwise it starts to smack of postcolonialism. “As a rule these are experts from Russia, the USA and Europe. Well, Russia is the former imperial centre, the former capital; the USA and EU are the ‘golden billion’ where all the good universities are. These discussions can end up degenerating into a situation where, as it were, it’s ‘white’ people saying ‘these savages just can’t agree amongst themselves’.”

Shahin Hajiyev saw a positive side to the role of foreign experts. In his opinion, the analytical work undertaken by these experts is of particular value because they can travel freely to both Armenia and Azerbaijan, sounding out public attitudes in the two countries and analysing the processes impartially.

“They sometimes do things that we don’t dare to do, whether out of a sense of false patriotism or self-preservation, it’s no secret. So reports by the International Crisis Group or American organisation Stratfor can be quite useful. In any case, a lot of what we’re trying to suggest to each other and agree on today has been put forward by these entities all along. I hope that this experience will be taken into account in both Armenian and Azerbaijan”, he concluded.

Translated from Russian by Heather Stacey. Read the original article here.

Watch the full broadcast below