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For the first time within an electoral period international intermediaries – co-chairs of the Minsk OSCE Group on Nagorno-Karabakh settlement (Russia, the USA, France) have gained the opportunity to proceed consulting the parties in and outside the region, as stated in the review. During the meetings held the international intermediaries intended to extend direct contacts of the Parties to reach an agreement on the basic principles of the conflict settlement. Armenian-Azerbaijani meetings at the summit level were held twice (on June 6th in Saint-Petersburg and on November 2nd in Moscow).

Repeated summits of the Russian Federation President Dmitry Medvedev with his Azerbaijani and Armenian colleagues Ilham Aliyev and Serge Sarkisian included detailed discussions of Nagorno-Karabakh problem and promoted the leading role of Russia in Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement, as underlined in the document.

The meeting of the confronting states in Moscow, held under the invitation and with participation of the Russian President, concluded with the adoption of three-party declaration directed on peaceful Nagorno-Karabakh conflict regulation by political means, – states the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. This is first document referring to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict that was signed by the Heads of Azerbaijan and Armenia, noted in the document.

According to APA, the review also underlines, that 2008 was marked by a stable development of relations and intensive political dialogue between Azerbaijan and Russia. It’s specified that the re-election of Ilham Aliyev as the President of Azerbaijan promoted more extended cooperation between the two countries.

The President of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev officially visited Baku in July of 2008, where the Presidents signed the Declaration of friendship and strategic partnership. Russian-Azerbaijani trade-economic relations have also developed intensively. The goods turnover between Azerbaijan and Russia has reached almost 2 billion dollars for the first time in 10 months.

However, one of the leading American political analyst Zbigniew Brzezinski is not that optimistic over the possibilities of the USA and Russia to regulate Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict. The settlement of territorial conflicts in South Caucuses depends greatly on the willingness of the Parties to conflict to compromise, rather then on the wishes even of the kind of world-powers as the USA and Russia, considers the leading American political analyst Zbigniew Brzezinski.

“I’m convinced that neither the USA nor Russia can solve these problems on their own”, – stated the former Counselor to National Security issues of the President Jimmy Carter Administration to Trend News.

There are two unsettled conflicts in South Caucuses – between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the territorial claims for Nagorny Karabakh; recent conflict of Georgia over the separated territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In addition, in 1993 Armenia and Turkey broke diplomatic relations because of the anti-Turkish campaign of Yerevan, connected with the so-called “genocide of Armenians” and occupation of 20% of Azerbaijani territory by Armenia.

Brzezinski considers that the countries, directly involved into the conflict, have a choice either to reach a compromise or to insist on status-quo for one reason or another. He considers that this means, that they are able to settle the conflict without anybody’s assistance, but the attitude of the Parties involved into the conflict towards the process of conflicts regulation is still important.

“Their willingness to compromise – is an extremely important element in this complicated process, – he said. – That’s why one shouldn’t underestimate how constructive settlement of “frozen” conflicts depends on the USA or Russia”.

Despite that Moscow directly participates in Georgian processes, it doesn’t give it a potential to settle the so-called frozen conflicts, assumes Brzezinski. He thinks that Russia can contribute into this conflicts regulation, by demonstrating diplomatic initiative and supporting existing international principles, which include territorial integrity and respect of national sovereignty.

“The same benefits can present the United States of America”, – considers Brzezinski. However, the productivity of the leading co-chairs of the Minsk OSCE Group presented by Russia and the USA seems to be miserable. The thing is that they can’t still choose the approaches to the conflict settlement, corresponding with the principles mentioned above by Mr. Brzezinski. But this is only a half of problem. They even have no courage to point in public the violator of the regime of cease-fire during international monitoring.

The head of the USA mission at OSCE Kyle Scott made an announcement on behalf of the co-chairs of Minsk OSCE Group, that stated: “We call for the Parties to the conflict to follow the principle of cease-fire rigorously and we are sincerely sorry about the death of 30 people and about injuring of 50 people in 2008 as a consequences of the cease-fire violation”.

We are strongly condemn the cease-fire violation during the OSCE mission monitoring, especially considering that local commanders have provided written guarantees of OSCE monitoring security not long before the beginning of monitoring on February 26th.

We demand for the Parties to explain how could this outrageous violation of cease-fire possibly happen.

We regret that not all the Parties agreed on recommendations, that were sounded by the co-chairs of the Minsk OSCE Group during the Council of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs in Helsinki in December 2008 on withdrawal of sniper shooters from the line of contact.

We express absolute support and admiration by the work of personal representative of the current OSCE chairman Andrzej Kasprzyk and his team. We also emphasize the importance of monitoring within the line of contact as a measure of confidence enhancement between the Parties”, – states the declaration.

And some experts specify the possible influence of Turkish-Armenian dialogue on the settlement of Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict around Nagorny Karabakh. Peace negotiations between Armenia and Azerbaijan through mediation of the Minsk OSCE Group and meetings on different levels on Armenian-Turkish relations – these are two processes, that are able influence each other, thinks the project manager of the program on Eurasia International Alert Desislava Rusanova (Trend News).

“The improvement of one of these processes can positively affect each other, and finally, influence peaceful regulation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.”, – said Rusanova. “Each of these processes has individual aspects. These are parallel, but separate processes. But their success will influence positively the dynamics in general”, – considers Rusanova.

According to the expert, the peaceful settlement can be achieved only if the dialogue proceeds.

“There is no definite prescription of Nagorno-Karabakh conflict regulation. The decision should be approved by all the Parties. The achievement of this decision is a complicated process and demands responsible moves and liabilities of all Parties, their Leaders and peoples.” – said Rusanova.

As she stated, the Presidents of Azerbaijan and Armenia expressed their firm commitment to proceed negotiating on political way of the conflict settlement. “The Presidents admit that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict regulation is a complicated objective and anticipates the establishment of conditions to enhance confidence between the Parties”, – assumes the expert.

R.Mirkadyrov

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The IDF’s emphasis on compliance with the Law of Armed Conflict was directly incorporated into the rules of engagement for the Gaza operation. The operational order emphasized four guiding principles: military necessity, distinction, proportionality and humanity.

The legal section of the operational order further enumerates several absolute prohibitions. With respect to targeting decisions, the document set out the governing legal principles with regard to particular targets, which included the following:

Only military targets may be attacked. Any attack against civilian objectives is prohibited. A “civilian objective” is any objective which is not a military target. Subject to the principle of proportionality, when a civilian objective is used by the enemy for a military activity it loses its protection and immunity and becomes a legitimate military target. Subject to the principle of proportionality, the presence of civilians within a military objective or in its vicinity does not negate the military character of the objective. Subject to the principle of proportionality, a dual use objective may be attacked if reliable, conclusive and up-to-date information confirms that it serves the military activities of the enemy.

The document further confirmed the importance of minimizing incidental harm to civilians and civilian facilities. IDF forces were to use only weapons approved as legal by IDF authorities. The order contained numerous other provisions designed to implement the Law of Armed Conflict. Among other things, the document provided that:

Destruction of property would be allowed only for imperative operational necessity. The presence of enemy combatants among the civilian populations would not deny the civilian character of the population. Precautionary measures must be employed to minimize the risk for civilians in the course of the hostilities.

The IDF’s rules of engagement strictly prohibit the use of civilians as human shields. Moreover, the Israel Supreme Court has ruled that use of civilians in any capacity for the purpose of military operations is unlawful. The IDF took a variety of measures to teach and instill awareness of these rules of engagement in commanders and soldiers.

(adeel.peace@gmail.com)

It’s shocking! I am writing this article on the 2nd Jan 2009, which is the seventh day since Israel launched a massive attack on the people of Gaza. This is the biggest Israeli assault on Gaza since 1967 and the humanitarian crisis is at its worse since 40 years. It’s been about 90 years since the Balfour declaration was made, which was one of the major steps marking the beginning of this nightmare for the Palestinian people. There seems to be no solution to this conflict, but who is to be blamed. Of course there were many mistakes made in history. But, for the present there are some things which are making this conflict worse and I think the ones to be blamed are

1) The media is on the top list of the ones to be blamed for its intensely biased approach towards this conflict. Firstly, the biggest problem with the media nowadays is its blindness towards the history of this conflict. People nowadays are very aware of the present affairs due to the media, but profoundly illiterate of the past. People like me who are young and do not study history as a subject have to place in some effort to learn about this conflict. The problem with situations of conflict is that you always have multiple versions of history and if you start searching for slightly less biased accounts, it’s almost impossible. Its been quite a while since I have been trying to educate myself of the history of this problem and it was a difficult task. After some research I have come to realize that media is just a way to misinform fools who are already ill-informed. 
Take this conflict; you seldom hear the media discussing the Balfour declaration and the scenarios in which this whole conflict evolved. The media never addresses the question “who is the oppressor and who is the oppressed?” in a historical context. People around the world are confused whether it’s Hamas which is to be blamed for firing rockets in Israel or is it Israel who is blameworthy for its disproportionate response. No one agrees that killing innocent civilians is justified but the media being controlled by the west has always this longing to portray Israel as being the victim of these rocket attacks. They never portray it as the aggressor occupying foreign land. I agree with the Israeli rhetoric that no sovereign country can allow rockets being fired on its citizens. But, then how can one allow people to occupy land which belongs to them. The justification that we are getting for the present incursion is that Hamas broke the cease fire. It was this same media that reported a month back that Israel has broken the truce by killing six members of the Hamas movement on November 4. Now the media is simply turning a blind eye to history as it does. 
2) Secondly, the United Nations has failed to prevent war. It was created after the Second World War to stop conflicts. It failed to stop the Iraq war and now the killing of innocent people in Gaza. It should be dissolved or degraded to only a humanitarian crises organization. No one seems to listen to the shouting UN secretary general that this should be stopped.
3) The Arabs leaders have failed miserably to help their Arab brothers in this crisis situation. It’s utterly shocking to see Egypt close its border for innocent people trying to escape death. Arab leaders have failed to represent their people. One can easily feel the hopelessness in the Palestinian people of being abandoned by the international community and their neighboring Arab countries.

People like me dream of a peaceful world, but I don’t think that is something near in time. Oppression always breeds resistance and the way this conflict is going there is a fear of an intense response from the Palestinian people. I just heard in the news about the killing of a whole family by an Israeli F-16. Only one young member of that family survived and he is not going to grow up as some one who offers peace to the region.

The causes of the Israel Palestine conflict are complex. In fact the very question is a bit of an oxymoron. Consider that before Israel existed the entire area was known as Palestine, not a state, not a nation, but a region of the former Ottoman Empire under the administration of the British authorities by mandate of the now defunct League of Nations.

One of the best ways to learn about these issues is to take an Alternative Tour of Israel and the West Bank and examine the situation on the ground.

During the Ottoman Era the region was not even known as Palestine by the governing authorities, but was divided into administrative regions known as ‘Vilayets’, then subdivided into smaller administrative units known as ‘Sanjaks’. The term Palestine was used loosely by the inhabitants, Jews, Christians and Muslims to describe their affinity for the region. during the first world war the European powers conquered the region and assumed control. The region designated for British Administration was termed ‘Palestine’ and all inhabitants, regardless of religion were issued identity cards labeling their nationality as Palestinians.

It was during this period that conflict arose between Palestinian Arabs and the Zionist settlers who were arriving from Eastern Europe and Russia. Israel had not yet been created but the desire of the European settlers to create exclusive Jewish communities gave rise to conflict with Palestinian Arabs. In addition European Zionist funds were used to purchase land from absentee landowners and the Arab residents of the land were often evicted by the new owners. This process exasperated the conflict with often violent results.

During 1947 and 1948 when the state of Israel was formed, hundreds of thousands of Palestinian Arabs were evicted or fled from their homes in the land that became Israel and never allowed to return. These people and their descendants became the Palestinian Refugees of today and their plight is the root and cause of the Israel Palestine conflict.

There are a number of new alternative tour companies that specialize in study tours, and justice tours.

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