“The meeting in Brussels has been announced and supported by the three participants, but the fact that the exact date has not yet been announced tells that the meeting would take place prematurely…, Farhad Mammadov says in his Telegram Channel.
The current Brussels meeting is to take place after the failure of the Granada meeting. France was unable to seat the Azerbaijani president at the negotiating table with its own agenda. For this purpose, Macron wanted to use the participation of the German Chancellor, but this did not work either. The Chancellor spoke separately with the Azerbaijani president before the Granada meeting.
The EU has an unspoken “division of labor” between France and Germany: Germany is the leader in Central Asia, France is the leader in the South Caucasus. In this “division of labor,” Berlin and Paris complement and support each other. Therefore, the Chancellor participates in French initiatives, and the refusal of the Azerbaijani president to fly to Granada is a signal to Germany that France’s position in the region is weak and vesting Paris with leadership within the EU is fraught with consequences for German interests in both the South Caucasus and Central Asia.
France managed to pass the Granada document, where Paris brought Berlin and Brussels to unilateral guarantees to Armenia.
Over the past week, France has taken steps that are relevant to the Brussels meeting. They are the initiative announced by the French foreign minister at the level of the UN Security Council, military-technical cooperation with Armenia, resolutions of the European Parliament, PACE and EU countries.
What is behind the rush?!
Against the backdrop of the failure of its initiatives, in order not to lose face in front of Berlin, Paris, with its desperate actions, seeks to create a framework for Charles Michel, a framework for the unilateral Granada statement.
For France, the very holding of a trilateral meeting without the participation of Paris is a waste of time, so the meeting should either be within the framework set by Paris, or it should not take place at all.
Much depends on Charles Michel… how he will prepare for the meeting and draw up the agenda…
The line of contradictions in relations between Baku and Paris has already been overcome: an event on France’s colonial policy in Baku is an investment by Azerbaijan in a long-term confrontation.
We can assume that France may go even further, igniting the fuse of regional confrontation.
Indeed, if the peace treaty agenda is successful, France will find itself in a situation where all its initiatives on Armenia and Karabakh will hang in the air, and relations with Baku to remain tense…
Statements coming from Armenia (Pashinyan almost disowned the words that there were no mass casualties in Karabakh, Shahramanyan reports that the signed decree on the self-dissolution of “NKR” is invalid) indicate that in Yerevan, they are trying to win back… let’s see how much this will play far…
Azerbaijan is facing a multi-level task:
⁃ return the Brussels format to a constructive direction. The refusal from the Granada meeting must strengthen Michel’s position if he is to continue and succeed…
⁃ marginalize France with its destructive position within the framework of Brussels-Paris-Berlin…
⁃ in case of failure of the Brussels format, activate other formats and adjust the position on Armenia…
We are approaching the next watershed in the Armenian-Azerbaijani track…” writes Farhad Mammadov.
Caliber.Az
