On December 1, 1989, there was neither the independent Republic of Armenia nor independent Republic of Nagorno Karabakh. Another two years had to pass since that day before they declared their sovereignty; one of them did receive international recognition, the other one didn’t.
Nonetheless, 20 years ago today the Supreme Council of the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic and the National Council of the Autonomous Region of Nagorno Karabakh (ARNK) passed a joint resolution on “Reunification of Armenian SSR and Nagorno Karabakh”.
On that historically significant day mass media did not even report the resolution as everybody was busy covering more global events.
The most notable event of the day was, the meeting between the US and USSR leaders George Bush and Mikhail Gorbachev in Malta. World press cameras were all over the Mediterranean shore trying to record Bush and Secretary of State James Baker coming down from aboard the Belknap cruiser – the US Sixth Fleet flagship.
It was hardly known to anybody that thousands of miles away from the Maltese shore the Armenian nation was determining its own fate, and that was regardless of the results of that historic meeting.
The Republic of Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh held their own referendums of independence, were declared as two Armenian republics, formed two governments, each elected their president, adopted their separate constitutions.
In these days of border debate and protocol process, the international community might show belated interest in the joint resolution.
During last week’s meeting in Munich between President Serzh Sargsyan of Armenia and President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan an announcement of proposed withdrawal of Armenian troops from lands adjacent to the territory of former ARNK might be grounded by the fact that in the December 1 document ‘Nagorno Karabakh’ implies the ARNK area which is three times smaller than the territory of the Republic of Nagorno Karabakh.
There is little doubt that as the process of the Karabakh issue settlement intensifies, it is in this view that the joint resolution of 20 years ago will yet be recalled and not just once.
Storm is in the air in Armenia’s domestic political field connected to determining and officially voicing the geography of the subject of negotiations.
Neither Armenia’s authorities nor the opposition has clarified positions yet on definitions of NKR territory. The resolution signed two decades ago to little acknowledgement beyond home, has never had more pertinent application and is likely to take a new role in Armenian domestic policy.
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