The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) telegram channel published an essentially "ultimatum warning" to Azerbaijan on behalf of the Iranian authorities: "President Raisi has made it clear to President Aliyev of Azerbaijan that any change in historical borders, regional geopolitics and Iran-Armenia transit routes is unacceptable. He also rejects any European military presence under any pretext. The West cannot distract us strategically," the IRGC states.

At the same time, anti-Azerbaijani rhetoric of Iranian media and IRGC resources has recently gone off the scale, which makes Armenian nationalists very happy. They continue provocative anti-Azerbaijani hysteria and already "anticipate" a war between Iran and Azerbaijan for Armenian interests. 

Armenian telegram channels quote feted "Iranian analyst" Salar Seif:

"Aliyev wants to launch a large-scale operation in Karabakh in the coming days. This operation is not only against Armenia, it is also against Iran. There are omens: 1- Fake throw-ups in Baku media about troops moving from Iran to Karabakh 2. The timing of the attack is chosen to coincide with the fortnightly Novruz holiday in Iran. Regardless of who rules in Iran, any military movement in Karabakh by the Baku-Ankara-Tel Aviv triangle is usually an action against Iran's geopolitical interests."

What is most interesting, but "on other fronts" the Islamic Republic of Iran is clearly showing a tendency towards "conciliation". Thus it has come to light that Iranian President Ibrahim Raisi has accepted an invitation from King Salman of Saudi Arabia to visit the kingdom following a reconciliation agreement between the two countries.

"In a letter to President Raisi, the King of Saudi Arabia welcomed the deal between the two brotherly countries [and] invited him to Riyadh," Mohammad Jamshidi, Iran's deputy presidential chief of staff for political affairs, wrote on Twitter.

Meanwhile, in fact, Saudi Arabia and Iran were at war until recently. True, not "directly" with each other, but through Iranian proxies in Yemen, the Hussein and the ubiquitous IRGC, which was quite successful on the "Yemeni front", in fact transferring military operations to Saudi territory.

But with Chinese mediation, Saudi Arabia and Iran "came to an abrupt end". This means that the IRGC has an opportunity to move some of its forces "from the Yemeni front" to the South Caucasus. 

By the way, the visit of President of the People's Republic of China Xi Jinping to Moscow which was announced as a "peacekeeping" one will take place on March 20-22, 2023; many people connect with it serious hopes for some "calm" on the Ukrainian front. Incidentally, raids on Ukraine by Iranian "shahid" drones, with the help of which Russia seriously battered the Ukrainian energy infrastructure last winter, have become very rare in recent weeks; there is no information about new large-scale deliveries of Iranian drones to Russia either. Perhaps they are simply being "saved" for military operations "on another front".

The impression is that some very powerful forces began to sharply "extinguish" the already hot conflicts away from the South Caucasus, and on the contrary, they seek "to ignite a big war in the South Caucasus in order to "save Armenians of Artsakh". France, the traditional patron of Armenian nationalists, is also thinking of joining this 'rescue'.

According to the French newspaper Le Figaro in the French Senate, a dozen or so French MPs and politicians called on official Paris to "mobilise to protect Armenians" in the separatist enclave in Karabakh and adopt a UN resolution to end the non-existent "blockade" on the Lachin road. Also, former French foreign minister Kouchner has floated the idea of "sending two humanitarian convoys, from France and the EU" to Karabakh to "deal with the blockade".

It is obvious that information preparations for a new war in the South Caucasus are already underway. And this cannot but cause alarm. Information has also emerged that the IRGC is preparing for a terrorist war against Azerbaijan, setting up special units, which means that there could be serious provocations to draw Iran into the war on the side of the Armenian nationalists.

In particular, information was leaked to the press that the IRGC was training terrorists in Iraq's Sinjar to "create chaos in Karabakh. Sinjar, which is known to be a place of compact settlements of Yezidi Kurds on the territory of Iraq, but is now under the IRGC's control. Iranian military experts are conducting special training for fighters of Kurdish terrorist formations PKK and Iraqi paramilitary unit Al-Hashd Al-Shaabi.

One of the most influential pro-government Turkish publications Türkiye Gazetesi reports that special training is being carried out in two closed camps, according to sources in Iraqi security agencies. Al-Hashd al-Shaabi commander Sheikh Abu Marwa is in charge of recruitment and logistics and is selected mainly among Yazidi members of the organisation. It is alleged that the training of 2,000 PKK terrorists and 2,000 Shiite militias is part of Iran's intervention in Karabakh. In Zangezur, where Iran has opened a consulate, work is also underway among local Yazidis, numbering some 100,000 across Armenia. "Is Iran planning to turn Karabakh into a second Syria?" - asks Türkiye Gazetesi rhetorically.

There are also reports that members of Kurdish PKK terrorist groups and Armenians are trained together in an Iranian-run camp in Karabakh. There is a danger that the IRGC will manage to move thousands of fighters into Karabakh territory with the help of Armenia and the Russian peacekeeping contingent.

The risk of igniting a major war in the South Caucasus cannot be underestimated today. Time is playing against the Armenian nationalists, and they are clearly "hastening events", counting on provocations and on the fact that the current regime in Iran as the last real "pro-Armenian" force in the region "will fit in" for the separatist "Artsakh" project. After all, in a year and a half more, Russian peacekeepers will leave Karabakh and "Artsakh" will be forgotten forever.

Giorgi Kvinitadze