By Edmond Y. Azadian
Armenia is caught between a rock and a hard place. All regional developments bypass Armenia either by design or by neglect.
Azerbaijan and Turkey are dead-set against Armenia and have been using their economic and political clout to isolate Yerevan from all regional projects, using the Karabakh conflict as an excuse, and prompting some desperate Armenian disinterested pundits to advise Armenia’s government to give in to concessions or to compromise in the disputed conflict.
However, those familiar with history will warn against such compromises and the Armenian people realize in their guts that the conflict with Azerbaijan does not begin nor end in Karabakh; it goes deep into history to face the real intentions of the Pan-Turkic movement. Armenia is and has been an obstacle in the path of a large Ottoman Empire and it was already the target of an attempt to wipe it off from the map to achieve that dream.
The other regional powers — and some friendly nations at that — have a pragmatic approach to all those problems; their participation in the reginal projects is dictated by their own national interests. Georgia, Iran and Russia are supposedly nations friendly to Armenia but they have virtually abandoned Armenia in its confrontation with Turkey. In view of their self-interest, Armenia has become politically dispensable and left to its own devices to survive.
The hostility of Turkey and Azerbaijan is not simply imagined by Armenia. It is out in the open; It is expressed in words and deeds.