Development of Armenia-Russia Air Defense is a Step with Serious Implications: Nickolay Kapitonenko
“NATO will strive to return Nagorno-Karabakh conflict to a frozen status,” Nickolay Kapitonenko, Director at the Kyiv-based Center for International Relations Research, Ukrainian analyst, told this at online press conference launched by “Region” research center, touching upon “NATO and the South Caucasus security issues,” “Regions of primary responsibility for NATO.”
Touching upon the role of NATO in the post-Soviet area, Nickolay Kapitonenko stated that role, as usual is rather complicated. According to him, on the one hand, NATO is a productive tool to repress Russia, many in Georgia and Ukraine refer to this structure only from this perspective. On the other hand, according to Kapitonenko, NATO is the “monster” around which Russia builds its foreign policy in the post-Soviet area.
“Primary issues of NATO include balance recovery, clarification of the role and policy towards Russia, on which depends regional security in Europe. This will help to understand perspectives for the membership of Ukraine and Georgia. I think the most possible scenario is further deepening of relations of these countries with NATO without membership.”
Possibility of this process is high, higher than in case of membership road map,” he said. To the question whether Azerbaijan will be criticized for initiating the four-day war at NATO summit in Warsaw, Kapitonenko replied, that official faces of the alliance will touch upon the tension on the contact line. “This means they will call the sides to settle the conflict peacefully. Criticism directed to Karabakh in this case is less possible,” he said.
In his conviction, NATO mainly reflecting to positions of its member countries, will strive to return NK conflict to the “frozen” status or latent phase, escalation won’t give any positive result. “Challenges in the field of security are enough, thus, NATO will strive to prevent or lead those challenges to the minimum,” the Ukrainian analyst stressed.
To the question, whether creation of Armenia-Russia air defense system isn’t dangerous form NATO-Armenia relations, and if NATO will observe Armenia as a hostile country, closing communications tubes with NATO, the analyst replied, that development of air defense regional system in the Caucasus is a step with its serious implications for regional security.
“However, not for Armenia-NATO relations. The agreement on Armenia-NATO individual partnership takes into consideration nature of Armenia-Russia relations, in particular, Armenia’s membership to CSTO. I consider, changes won’t be recorded in Armenia-NATO-Russia triangle. NATO also realizes the importance of communications with all countries of the region, narrowing of possibilities will mean complication of the situation, thus it’s less possible,” Nickolay Kapitonenko said.
By Araks Martirosyan
