Robert Kocharyan States How the Karabakh Issue Could Have Been Resolved

The second President of Armenia, Robert Kocharyan, expressed his belief during a conversation with Vladimir Pozner that the Armenian government's approach to the negotiation process in recent years has led to a deadlock.

Kocharyan stated in the Russian First Channel's «Pozner» program that before the war, the existing negotiation process involved the concession of territories under Armenian control in exchange for the status of Nagorno-Karabakh.
«The exchange of our controlled territories for the status of Nagorno-Karabakh. This is what is called the Madrid principles,» stated Kocharyan. «There is the former territory of the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast and surrounding regions. They were included in the composition of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, but they were also perceived as a buffer zone. It was assumed that this topic was negotiable concerning the status.»

In his view, the Armenian government’s approach in recent years has brought the negotiation process to a standstill. «Where negotiations end, war begins,» said Kocharyan, adding that the new Armenian government started the negotiation process from scratch, then demanded the participation of Karabakh in the negotiations, and then declared, ‘Karabakh is Armenia, and that’s it.’

As a result, according to Kocharyan, there was a perception that the Armenian side was distancing itself from the negotiation process. «I think they didn’t understand that this was inciting conflict. It was a somewhat primitive way to avoid responsible and difficult negotiations,» he said.

Speaking about the possibility of the complete loss of Karabakh, Kocharyan stated that if it weren’t for the active intervention of Russian President Vladimir Putin, such an outcome would have been entirely likely.