ANALYTICS

'Kalantarov-Blinken Pact' or the exchange of 'Nord Stream' for 'Zangezur Corridor'

22.05.21 11:00


After a meeting between US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov (real name Kalantarov) at the meeting of the Arctic Council, which includes the United States, Russia, and six other countries with territories beyond the Arctic Circle, Russian media began writing enthusiastic victorious reports. Say, the United States is no longer opposing Nord Stream, a gas pipeline that is 95% ready. Indeed, according to Anthony Blinken, the information is confirmed that the United States will lift sanctions against companies building Nord Stream.

 

“Today, the Department of State submitted a report to Congress in accordance with the amendments to the PEESA law, identifying four vessels, five organizations and one person involved in the construction of the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, including Nord Stream 2 AG and the head of the company Matthias Waring. The individuals named in the report are subject to sanctions, ”said US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken's statement, which was circulated on Thursday night during his meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.


The statement notes that it was decided to suspend the implementation of the sanctions "in the national interests of the United States."

 

However, as you know, not just any concessions, especially "in the national interests", the United States just does not go. Moreover, in recent years, the United States and its NATO allies have taken unprecedented measures to get Russia to yield in other geopolitically important areas. So, in return for "concessions" on the "Nord Stream", the United States will demand from the Russian Federation a serious "retreat" in other places.

 

Following the results of the Blinken-Kalantarov Pact, the main concessions of the Russian Federation have been outlined - it is not difficult to guess where. “On the southern flank”, where Russia is being driven out both from the South Caucasus and Central Asia.
In light of this, the recent border clashes on the border between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan do not look random. Especially when you consider that as a peacemaker and arbiter, the same Central Asian countries are beginning to increasingly turn not to Russia, but to the United States and Turkey.

 

Until recently, certain forces in the Kremlin and the Southern Gas Corridor, which strategically for the same European gas security are of much greater importance than the Nord Stream, opposed. As well as other transit routes through the South Caucasus.

 

According to experts, this, in particular, was connected with the armed provocations of the Armenian military on the border with the Tavush region of Azerbaijan last summer. However, the defeat of the Armenian aggressors in the Second Karabakh War finally secured transit communications passing through Azerbaijan and Georgia from the point of military sabotage by Armenia.

 

Moreover, now we are talking about unblocking another strategically important corridor - through the Zangezur, which is under Armenian control, separating Nakhichevan from the main territory of Azerbaijan. It is against the Zangezur corridor that in recent weeks both the Armenian lobby, with France behind it, and outright terrorists like Zhirayr Sefilyan have taken up arms. As an "alternative" to this corridor, the absolutely unviable project of the "Iran-Black Sea" corridor through Armenia was launched.

 

"As if by order" it was precisely at this moment that the stirring up of the conflict in the small town of Dmanisi, which was clearly calculated to deteriorate Georgian-Azerbaijani relations, was timed. Initially, the conflict around the local store was, at first glance, it was a household one - those regularly arise in the provinces, where there are a lot of unemployed and in stores, there is a practice of selling goods to insolvent customers “on loan”. But the conflict that arose, certain “bots” in social networks and pro-Armenian media began to promote as “interethnic”.

 

At the same time, the implementation of the agreement concluded with the mediation of Russia on November 10, 2020, on the Zangezur corridor was clearly hampered. Russia declared itself as, albeit destructive, but a "player" on the southern transit corridors.

 

However, the meeting between Blinken and Lavrov-Kaoantarov in Reykjavik seems likely to end in a "big geopolitical exchange." And for the opportunity to complete the construction of the Nord Stream and even present it as its “great geopolitical victory”, the Kremlin will be required to take a constructive position on the Southern transit corridors, adhere to previously reached agreements, and renounce provocations.

 

It should be reminded that in many respects it was in exchange for the organization of the Zangezur corridor that Azerbaijan agreed to a five-year stay of Russian peacekeepers in the part of Karabakh inhabited by ethnic Armenians. Alas, this stay so far does not particularly enlighten the citizens of Azerbaijan of Armenian nationality. A monument to the Nazi Nzhdeh has not yet been dismantled in Khojavend. Russian peacekeepers are still hesitating to take measures to put an end to the glorification of Nazi criminals on Azerbaijani territory, and have not stopped the destructive activities of separatists who harm the very Armenians of Azerbaijani Karabakh.


At the same time, in Armenia itself, the military hysteria of the Armenian nationalists is being whipped up about Azerbaijan's clarification of its border in the area of ​​Lake Karagel.

 

The sooner the Zangezur corridor is organized, the sooner stability will return to the South Caucasus region. In return, Russia will be able to settle all controversial issues in the north, where the situation from a military point of view is not so explosive and the Nord Stream has a purely economic significance. Whether it was possible to reach an agreement in Reykjavik in this vein will be seen from the events of the coming weeks.

 

It should also not be forgotten that Reykjavik has once played its key role in history - the leaders of the USSR and the United States, Gorbachev and Reagan, met there in 1986, after which the USSR's “withdrawal” from Eastern Europe began. And in the same place, in Reykjavik, the current leader of the Russian Federation, Putin, may meet with US President Biden.

 

 

KavkazPlus

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