In an article for the Russian-language version of the Internationale Politik und Gesellschaft (IPG or International Politics and Society) magazine RSC Director Richard Giragosian offered a preview of the EU’s November Eastern Partnership summit in Brussels. In this article, entitled “До встречи в Брюсселе! Перспективы Восточного партнерства зависят от гораздо большего, чем документы и заявления на саммитах,” Giragosian focused on risk and resiliency in the Eastern Partnership.
In a contribution to the “Emerging Europe” website, RSC Director Richard Giragosian assessed the risk of renewed hostilities over Nagorno-Karabakh, and added recommendations for de-escalation, including “status-neutral” engagement by the EU and support for direct contacts by all sides to the conflict. The article, entitled “Nagorno-Karabakh conflict moves from frozen to kinetic,” noted that “given the strategic significance of the emerging threat from a renewed war over Nagorno-Karabakh, the imperative is to engage now, before this kinetic conflict spirals dangerously out of control.”
Armenian version: “Ղարաբաղյան հակամարտությունը սառեցվածից վերածվում է գործողի," Emerging Europe, 21 Օգոստոս 2017
RSC Senior Analyst Mikayel Zolyan, in an analytical article for the online weekly magazine EVN Report, offered a unique assessment of the domestic political situation in Armenia, with a focus on the possibility of the incumbent president continuing to serve as the head of state. The article, entitled “To Be or Not to Be Prime Minister? Serzh Sargsyan’s Dilemma and What it Means for Armenia’s Politics,” was published on 8 August.
In a report by Nino Dalakishvili for the Georgian Service of Voice of America, RSC Senior Analyst David Shahnazaryan’s presentation on Russian policy in the South Caucasus was cited in a special report. The VOA piece cited Shahnazaryan as saying that “for Russia, there are no red lines,” but rather, has only moved more aggressively each time there was no Western reaction. He also added that “I do not believe that Putin is the main problem. In fact, the main problem is corruption within Russian society, and the Putin that they have created. Putin is very much a product of Russian society and corruption is just soft power in the hands of Russia.”
www.amerikiskhma.com/a/security-conference-tbilisi/3820591.html
Based on his remarks at the South Caucasus Security Forum 2017 in Tbilisi, RSC Senior Analyst David Shahnazaryan was quoted by Joshua Kucera in a piece for Eurasianet on the wider impact of the U. S. missile strikes on Syria, as a sign that the new Trump administration is willing to act tough against Russia. Shahnazaryan was quoted as saying that “I think what happened April 7 in Syria, the launching of the Tomahawk missiles, changed the situation very dramatically,” and adding that “the Kremlin now must be much more careful” and contending that “maybe this will slow down, a little bit, the possibility of another war” in the Caucasus.