Quick Acceptance of Azerbaijan’s Restoration of Control over Karabakh ‘Inevitably Raises Questions about Other Unrecognized Republics,’ Analysts Say

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Sept. 21 – The relative ease with which the international community and the Russian Federation accepted Azerbaijan’s restoration of control in Karabakh “inevitably raises the question about the remaining unrecognized territories of the former USSR,” Russian analysts say.

            While the situations of Abkhazia, South Ossetia and Transnistria are different from that of the former Artsakh, the fact that the world has accepted the Azerbaijani action so quickly and easily will change the dynamics of discussions about these places in Georgia and Moldova, analysts say (newizv.ru/news/2023-09-21/nepriznannym-prigotovitsya-chto-budet-s-abhaziey-yuzhnoy-osetiey-i-pridnestroviem-419777 and  ukraina.ru/20230922/1049612299.html).

            That is because one of the major constraints against Tbilisi and Chisinau taking military action was the widespread belief that neither the West nor, perhaps more significantly, Moscow, would sit calmly by if either did. Such concerns are likely still a factor, but they have been reduced by what has happened in the south Caucasus.

            And while analysts aren’t talking about other possibilities, such as using military force to change borders elsewhere on the former Soviet space, what has just happened in Karabakh is likely to have an impact as well, yet another result of Moscow’s use of force in Ukraine and its draw down of its offensive capacities elsewhere.