Armenia, Azerbaijan Clashes Test Russia’s Support for Regional Ally
Violence is the latest security challenge in Russia’s sphere of influence since Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine
A new round of fighting erupted between Armenia and Azerbaijan, threatening to unravel a cease-fire brokered by the Kremlin and testing its support for traditional allies during the war in Ukraine.
The violence, which is among the deadliest since the end of a war between the two countries in 2020, is the latest security challenge in Russia’s sphere of influence since Moscow launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February. Isolated by the West during the war, Russia has diminished leverage over some of its erstwhile partners in the post-Soviet world.
Armenia said on Tuesday that 49 of its soldiers had been killed in the clashes on its side of the border with Azerbaijan. The two countries have fought two wars over the Nagorno-Karabakh region and disputed the territory since the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. Azerbaijan said that it had been attacked by Armenia’s forces.
The Armenian prime minister’s office also said that the government decided to implement a 1997 mutual defense treaty with Russia, and appealed for help from the Collective Security Treaty Organization, a military alliance dominated by Russia.
Russia responded by calling for a de-escalation. The Russian Foreign Ministry said that Moscow had brokered a cease-fire in effect from Tuesday morning. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday that President Vladimir Putin was “making every effort to help de-escalate tensions on the border.”
Mr. Peskov’s remarks come after Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan discussed the border clashes in a phone call with Mr. Putin, according to comments carried by Russian state news agency RIA Novosti.
The fighting in the Caucasus region is the latest in a series of challenges to Russia’s dominance in its traditional sphere of influence before and during the war in Ukraine. In January, Russia sent 2,000 soldiers to help repress protests in Kazakhstan, and backed the government in Belarus against a mass antigovernment uprising in 2020.
“What was driving this was both the perception and a reality of Russian weakness, especially given recent developments in the Ukrainian theater. Azerbaijan sensed a unique opportunity but also a closing window of opportunity to act and act boldly,” said Richard Giragosian, the director of the Regional Studies Center, a think tank in Armenia’s capital, Yerevan.
The invasion of Ukraine has limited Russia’s influence over some post-Soviet states, with countries like Kazakhstan remaining neutral in the conflict despite being the recipient of the Kremlin’s support during the protests in January.
The Ukraine invasion has tested the limits of Russia’s military strength, forcing it to draw resources from the periphery of its sphere of operations from places like Syria and the Russian Far East. It has also strained Russia’s economic and diplomatic relationships after Western countries imposed sweeping economic sanctions on Moscow.
Azerbaijan won the 2020 war, gaining ground thanks in part to military backing from Turkey, including Turkish-made Bayraktar TB-2 drones, which have proven effective against Russia and Russian-backed forces in a series of conflicts, including the war in Ukraine, further testing Russia’s military influence in the region. It was the second full-scale war between the two countries over Nagorno-Karabakh and adjacent territories after another conflict in 1994.
Turkey, another regional power that is both a partner and a rival of Russia, sided with Azerbaijan in this week’s hostilities, blaming Armenia for the flare-up.
“Armenia needs to learn its lesson and seek peace,” said Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu in comments on Tuesday. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is set to meet Mr. Putin on the sidelines of a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a Russian and Chinese-led body, in Uzbekistan later this week.
Armenia, which hosts a Russian military base, also appealed to the Russian-backed Collective Security Treaty Organization for aid during the 2020 war, but the alliance ignored those pleas.
Mr. Giragosian said the Armenian government is seeking to overhaul its relationship with Russia after a lack of significant help from the Kremlin during recent crises. Armenia is also working to normalize its relationship with Turkey in an attempt to diversify its relationships.
“The strategic imperative is to begin to confront Armenia’s over-dependence on Russia, especially after Ukraine, and to justify domestically, a deepening to the West and a pivot,” he said.
Western officials flew into the region on Tuesday in an attempt to defuse the hostilities. The State Department’s senior adviser for Caucasus negotiations, Philip Reeker, flew to Baku, the Azeri capital, on Tuesday to express U.S. support for peace talks. The European Union’s special envoy for the region, Toivo Klaar, was also traveling to the region, the EU said.
The State Department urged an immediate end to the hostilities. “There can be no military solution to the conflict,” the department said on Monday.