Welcome back to This Week in Peace, our weekly summary of events in global peacebuilding.
This week, Armenia and Azerbaijan grow closer to a historic peace despite the ongoing threat of war, a potential window for peace opens in Haiti, and Qatar brokers a rare deal between Russia and Ukraine.
Armenia and Azerbaijan
Armenia and Azerbaijan continue to inch closer to a historic peace treaty, which would end decades of conflict between the two former Soviet republics, which has escalated into open war at times. As part of an ongoing normalization and negotiation process, Armenia agreed to cede a small amount of territory, including four villages, to Azerbaijan, and this week the new border was demarcated for the first time. Protests broke out throughout Armenia, as the fallout from Azerbaijan’s quick takeover of the formerly disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, which caused an exodus of over one hundred thousand ethnic Armeninans and accusations of ethnic cleansing, continues to reshape the region. Russian peacekeepers, who failed to intervene in what appears to be retaliation for Armenia’s turn towards the West and continuing democratic progress, also departed. While the decision to give up the villages may be painful to many Armenians, it is an important step towards peace, especially since Azerbaijan’s dictator Ilham Aliyev continues to make aggressive statements regarding potential future conflict. Azerbaijan receives support from Turkey – which continues to deny the Armenian Genocide carried out by its predecessor, the Ottoman Empire, and has become an important supply of gas to the European Union, leaving Armenia isolated following the withdrawal of Russian support.
A chance for a new start in Haiti
Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry resigned yesterday, one of the major demands of the gangs that have unleashed weeks of violence on the capital of Port-au-Prince, which they now mostly control. Henry, who took power following the assassination of President Jovonel Moïse in 2023 (a killing which remains unsolved) had been the subject of considerable criticism within Haiti, and well-armed paramilitary gangs came together to attack prisons, hospitals, and the main airport in the capital while he was way on a diplomatic trip. A transitional presidential council, set up with the help of international actors including the United States and the Caribbean Council, along with civil society and representatives of religious and commercial groups, aims to resolve the crisis facing the country, with the help of a UN security deployment intended to restore order. The hope is that these developments will lead to peaceful elections and a government with popular support and legitimacy to address a years-long political and economic crisis.
A Qatari-mediated deal between Russia and Ukraine is a small success
This week, Qatar helped to broker a deal that resulted in one of the few positive stories from the Russian invasion of Ukraine. As part of ongoing efforts, Qatar helped to mediate between the two sides to return dozens of forcibly deported Ukrainian children, and to reunite Russian families as well, hosting 20 families from both sides in Doha this week. There is the potential for similar sort of deals to address other humanitarian issues in the conflict, including potential future prisoner exchanges. The forcible deportation of thousands of children from occupied areas of Ukraine, which has led the International Criminal Court to issue an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putin, is one of the more significant yet underreported aspects of the invasion. While many children remain in Russia and Belarus in unclear circumstances, this deal is a positive step forward for some, and leads to some hope that the rest may be reunited with their families and homes soon. In the future, this sort of third–party mediation, by a party not involved in the conflict, may even help to facilitate peace negotiations.
