The case of Armenian occupied Nagorno-Karabakh and Russian
annexed Crimea have many similarities. Armenia had already taken a precedent
two decades earlier by annexing Nagorno-Karabakh after it received massive
military support and energy subsidies from Russia.
The West has never sought to realistically remove Russian
control over frozen conflicts that have been in place since the early 1990s in
Moldova and Georgia where Russia has controlled Transdniestr in the former and
South Ossetia and Abkhazia in the latter. These regions have been subsidized by
Russia and its Moldovan and Georgian citizens illegally given Russian passports
making it possible for Russia to claim in August 2008 it was intervening in
defense of its citizens in South Ossetia. The same strategy is being used in the Crimea
and Eastern Ukraine with Russian President Putin claiming he is receiving thousands
of requests for Russian intervention.
In 2008, when Georgia attempted to re-take South Ossetia
there was greater EU and to a lesser extent US condemnation of President
Mikheil Saakashvili’s “recklessness” and “provocative action” than criticism of
Russia’s invasion. The EU’s dislike for
Saakashvili was surprising as he had presided over the most successful
Europeanization of the judicial system and the best executed anti-corruption
campaign in Eurasia.
Saakashvili was merely undertaking what Putin claimed when he
first came to power in 2000 he had a right to do in Chechnya; that is, defend
his country’s territorial integrity. Such a right and duty for Presidents and
heads of state is enshrined in most of the world’s constitutions.
Would the EU position be similarly critical if Ukraine sought
to militarily re-take the Crimea or alternatively launch a guerrilla war
against Russian occupation forces? Ukraine is undertaking an anti-terrorist
operation in Eastern Ukraine which has Western support, but for how long?
Turning a blind eye to Russian policy of promoting
annexations and frozen conflict zones was mistaken.
Firstly, they became major sources of soft security threats
to Europe; Transdniestr, for example, became a black hole through which flowed arms,
narcotics and human beings who were sex trafficked. Transdniestr’s black hole
inevitably exported corruption to neighboring Ukraine, especially through the
port of Odesa (The “Odessa Network”) which
has long been notoriously corrupt. Soft
security threats were also faced by EU and NATO member Romania which has a
cultural and linguistic affinity with its former region of Bessarabia (that
with Transdniestr added became Moldova).
Ethnic cleansing of Georgians in South Ossetia and Abkhazia
under Russian eyes took place to a greater degree than that undertaken by
Serbian nationalist leader Slobodan Milosevic against Kosovar Albanians. In
Kosovo ethnic cleansing was halted by NATO’s intervention and the region became
an independent state. Milosevic was declared a war criminal and died in 2006 in
his cell in the International Criminal Tribunal
for the former Yugoslavia.
President Putin – responsible for more human rights atrocities in Chechnya
than Milosevic in the former Yugoslavia – has never been indicted by the
International Criminal Court (ICC). Putin continues to not be included on any
international wanted lists for his brazen annexation of the Crimea and proxy
intervention in Eastern Ukraine, for which there is massive evidence.
Ethnic cleansing of the Crimean Tatars is only a matter of time. Anti-Tatar
xenophobia and racism has always been rife in the Crimea fanned by the
Communist Party, Party of Regions and local Russian nationalists who continue
to argue Soviet leader Joseph Stalin was correct to ethnically cleanse them in
1944. The deportation led to half of the Crimean Tatar population dying and is
remembered as genocide by them. A Tatar was tortured and murdered during the
initial Russian occupation in March 2014.
In Ukraine,
racism and xenophobia has been the most
widespread in the Crimea and the Council of Europe’s European
Commission on Racism and Intolerance (ECRI) condemned the fanning of anti-Tatar xenophobic and anti-Tatar ‘hate speech’ by the Crimean authorities.
Nagorno-Karabakh and the Crimea remain similar cases of
foreign annexation by Armenia and Russia respectfully and yet Western reaction
to them has been very different.
Firstly, Russian actions have been ignored because it has
nuclear weapons and is a member of the UN Security Council. Iran should take
note that Putin – but not Milosevic – has been able to get away with murder. Russia’s flouting of the 1994 Budapest
Memorandum, where Ukraine received security guarantees in exchange for denuclearization,
will inevitably spread nuclear weapons around the world.
Secondly, this is not the first time European lives are
viewed as more important. The West intervened to protect Kosovar Albanians but
will it intervene if there is ethnic cleansing of Crimean Tatars?
The Crimean Tatars have been largely ignored in the furor
over Russia’s annexation of the Crimea, even by Turkey’s ruling party. Indeed, four
Turkish Justice and Development deputies in the Parliamentary Assembly of the
Council of Europe (PACE) voted against the 10 April resolution on the Crimea,
whilst another three opposition Turkish Republican People’s Party PACE
delegates supported it. The resolution
suspended Russia’s voting rights in PACE.
Thirdly, Armenia has a large lobby in the US with which it
has proven difficult for Azerbaijan to compete.
The Crimea is the second occasion Russia has backed
annexations following its support for Armenia annexing Nagorno-Karabakh. Russia
has also supported three frozen conflicts in Georgia and Moldova. These taken
together should be dealt with as one common threat to the UN Charter and the
sanctity of territorial integrity.
