Russia, the OSCE, and Security in the Caucasus1

Stephen Blank

At its December 1994 summit in Budapest, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE2) agreed in principle to send peacekeeping forces to maintain a cease-fire in Nagorno-Karabakh and facilitate a political solution to the war. Over a half-year later, not a single OSCEpeacekeeper has yet been deployed in this predominantly Armenian enclave within , which has since 1988 witnessed periods of intense fighting, also involving military forces from proper. Nevertheless, this decision represents the OSCE's highest-profile engagement within the Caucasus and indeed any- where in the Commonwealth of Independent States (Cis). This engagement by an inter-governmental organization, accepted by Moscow itself, is all the more noteworthy given 's well-known interest in maintaining a leading role in its so-called 'near abroad' and in the Caucasus in particular. Since the break-up of the , the OSCE has been struggling with the problem of how to intervene constructively in trouble-spots within Russia's self-appointed sphere of influence. Conflict response in the former Soviet Union is in fact one of the greatest ongoing challenges for the or- ganization, which this year celebrates its twentieth anniversary. Already in 1992 the OSCE set up a multilateral process, known as the Minsk Group, aimed at negotiating a peaceful settlement to the Nagorno-Karabakh war. Elsewhere within the cIs, the OSCEhas also established in-country missions in Georgia, Moldova, and Tajikistan to monitor and help resolve the conflicts gripping these new states.3 These initiatives, building up to the December 1994 decision to provide peacekeepers for Nagorno-Karabakh, have laid the groundwork for OSCE involvement in the most daunting conflict in the former Soviet Union to date, the war in . Many factors have led to the OSCE's approach to conflicts in the former Soviet Union, especially the Caucasus. Regional ethnic conflicts, Russia's drive to create a new sphere of influence in the cIs and defend its territorial integrity against ethnic challenges, strategic considerations of European

1. This articleis a revisedversion of a paperpresented to the AnnualConvention of the Inter- nationalStudies Association, 22 February1995, Chicago, USA. The views expressedhere do not in any way representthose of the U.S. Army, Departmentof Defense,or U.S. Government. 2. In December1994 the Conferenceon Securityand Cooperationin Europe(CSCE) changed its name to the Organizationfor Securityand Cooperationin Europe(OSCE). The article will use OSCEto refer to both organizations. 3. Elsewherein the former SovietUnion - namelyin Estonia,Latvia, and Ukraine- the OSCEhas also deployedin-country missions in order to prevent minority-relatedand/or regionally-baseddisputes from escalatingto violentconflict. Over the last two-and-a-half years the OSCEHigh Commissioneron NationalMinorities has also been extremelyactive in promotingthe peacefulresolution of ethnictensions in countriesof the former Soviet Union,including, most notably,Estonia, Kazakhstan, Kyrygyzstan, Latvia, and Ukraine. 66 security, Russo-Turkish rivalries, and competition over major oil sources have shaped the context in which the OSCE must function in the former Soviet Union. To understand the magnitude of the osCE's actions, we must analyze the background to these decisions and implications of present trends for Russia, the region, and European security. - It is argued in this article that Russia's policy in Transcaucasia is dangerous because of its imperial implications. Moreover, this policy is directly at odds with Europe's decision, expressed in a number of OSCE activities, to expand the European security agenda to the CIS. Russia's policy and efforts to minimize European intervention in what it considers its own affairs or to manipulate the OSCE on its behalf, directly contradict Russia's programme for European security. Also Russia's policy raises a number of troubling issues concerning the use of its armed forces in relation to its neighbours and the accompanying question of control over the armed forces. Finally, all these phenomena taken together raise serious questions about the viability of the OSCE and the general European conflict resolution process at a time when the OSCE is expanding its purview and Russian policy remains a problematic aspect of Europe's security agenda.

Oil and Security in Transcaucasia When it acted in Budapest, the OSCE collided with Russia's interest in main- taining a free hand in Transcaucasia and the cIs in general. Russia claims to be the guarantor of the CiS's security, a stance at odds with Western govern- ments' stated assertion that international security should be a collective concern. With the generally dubious acquiescence of the states in question, Moscow has intervened with troops in the many ethnic wars in the Caucasus, ostensibly in a peacemaking role, but actually to create a new status quo. It recently secured long-term rights to a unified air defense using Russian assets and forces, obtained permanent bases in Armenia and Georgia, instigated coups in Azerbaijan in 1993 and 1994, and invaded Chechnya in late 1994 in defiance of protocols signed in Budapest five days earlier. More recently, Russian Minister of Defense, General Pavel Grachev, and the Commander-in- Chief of , General Vladimir Semenov, announced that Russia was breaking the rules of the treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) about stationing troops in the Caucasus because Russian security interests overrode the treaty.' Finally, Russia has strongly pressured Azer- baijan to allow Moscow to control its oil exploration and shipment and thereby 5 make Azerbaijan dependent upon Moscow.5 All these actions show the

4. 'The Bear's Jaws', in The Economist,22 April 1995, pp. 54-56; lprinda, Tbililsi, in Russian,15 April 1995, ForeignBroadcast Information Service, Central Eurasia, (Hence- forth FBISsov), 95-073, 17 April 1995,p. 72. 5. John Lloyd and Steve LeVine, 'Russia DemandsVeto Over Caspian Oil Deals', The Financial Times, 31 May 1994, p. 2, In November,Energy Minister Yuri Shafranik reiteratedMoscow's claims for the same reasons,John Lloyd, 'MoscowClaims Caspian