Yerevan /Mediamax/. The normalization process between Turkey and Armenia in some ways resembles Turkey’s negotiations with Kurdish rebels.

Al-Monitor Senior Correspondent Amberin Zaman writes about it in the article “Why Peace with Turkey has come to mean Survival for Armenia’s Pashinyan”.

“Ankara has made it clear that until Armenia finalizes a peace treaty with Baku, it will not make any major moves to accommodate him. Pashinyan has made one concession after another to get Azerbaijani strongman Ilham Aliyev to sign off. Aliyev keeps asking for more, notably control over a land bridge cleaving Armenia’s southern Syunik region that would connect Azerbaijan to Nakhichevan. Landlocked Armenia is keen to be part of a regional transport and energy hub but loath to let Azerbaijan control chunks of its sovereign territory, least of all if it means effectively cutting it off from its border with Iran.

In some ways, the normalization process between Turkey and Armenia resembles Turkey’s peace talks with the Kurdish rebels of the Kurdistan Workers Party. Responding to calls by their imprisoned leader, Abdullah Ocalan, they announced they were disbanding and disarming in May, though Ankara has not met a single one of their demands, because the alternative – more conflict against an ever more powerful Turkish military – is far worse,” Amberin Zaman writes. 

She notes that “Ankara is growing increasingly impatient with Baku, fearing that Pashinyan may not survive.” Yet, Zaman continues, Azerbaijan is one of the top investors in Turkey, as “Aliyev likes to remind Ankara.”