By Ilgar Gurbanov

June 27, 2019, the CACI Analyst

The regime change in Armenia revived hopes in Azerbaijan that the new Armenian government would take a more proactive approach to the frozen settlement process of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The latest meeting of Azerbaijan’s and Armenia’s leaders in Vienna promised humanitarian cooperation, yet the short-term silence on the frontline was soon broken by new ceasefire violations and counter-productive statements from the Armenian government. From Azerbaijan’s perspective, the building of trust required for a reinvigoration of the peace process requires steps such as the withdrawal of Armenian occupying forces from Azerbaijan’s territories, with a subsequent return of IDPs. Armenia’s overreliance on the status-quo creates systemic problems for the negotiations.

By Natalia Konarzewska

April 29, 2019, the CACI Analyst

In March 2019, two high-ranking Armenian officials revealed that Armenia and Russia have not yet reached an agreement on the price of natural gas. Negotiations on gas tariffs are ongoing and remain high on the bilateral agenda. In late December 2018, Gazprom announced that it will raise gas prices for Armenia in 2019. Subsequently, Armenia has sought to reduce the price for Russian supply, with little success. In a move to improve Armenia’s negotiating position vis-a-vis Russia, Yerevan started to explore the possibility of importing gas from Iran. The gas row comes amid heightened tensions in post-revolutionary Armenia’s relations with Russia. Moscow has traditionally used its gas deliveries as a lever in bilateral relations and now routinely expresses its distrust in Nikol Pashinyan’s government.

By Ilgar Gurbanov

March 27, 2019, the CACI Analyst

In parallel with their peace talks on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Azerbaijan and Armenia seek to diversify and deepen their partnerships with major arms suppliers. By diversifying its arms purchases from several different partners, Azerbaijan seeks to multiply its arsenal and retain a military advantage against Armenia, whose corresponding efforts aim to cement the status quo through military occupation of Azerbaijan’s territories. Both countries aim to maximize the tactical efficiency of their arsenals on the potential battlefield.

By Armen Grigoryan

March 20, 2019, the CACI Analyst

After winning an overwhelming majority at the snap parliamentary elections in December, Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has formed a new cabinet and presented its program. While Pashinyan enjoys a high level of public approval, probably the most serious challenge awaiting his cabinet in the coming months is withstanding the massive campaign by the former regime’s proxies to undermine the government’s credibility in order to avoid the prosecution of some top-level former officials and to prepare the ground for their possible return to power. Speculations about the possibility of unilateral concessions on the Nagorno-Karabakh issue have been at the center of the campaign.

By Emil A. Souleimanov and Huseyn Aliyev

January 23, 2019, the CACI Analyst

Recent weeks have seen an unprecedented series of high-level meetings of Armenian and Azerbaijani representatives on Nagorno-Karabakh, Azerbaijan’s breakaway territory closely linked since the early 1990s to Armenia. Whereas many analysts considered resumed peace talks unlikely after the April 2016 fighting, Armenia’s Velvet Revolution and the replacement of the country’s war-hardened Karabakh elite with a forward-looking and liberal government has provided new stimulus in this regard. As Azerbaijani officials perceive the recent power shift in Armenia as a window of opportunity to advance a peaceful solution to the long-standing conflict, optimism regarding the prospect of a deal appears higher than in many years.