This one day conference discussed the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict which is one of the most complex and protracted ethno-territorial conflicts in the post-Soviet space. It focused on the role of local and regional actors and the current political and academic discourses on the conflict.
The conference gathered together scholars, policy-makers and analysts with lengthy empirical and political experience of this turbulent region.
The conference was organised by The University of Birmingham Research Group on the Caucasus and Central Asia, The Centre for Russian European and Eurasian Studies, the Department of Political Science and International Studies, University of Birmingham, in collaboration with the Department of War Studies, King's College London.
Chair: Domitilla Sagramoso, King's College London
Speakers:
- Ambassador Jacques Faure, ex- co-chair of the OSCE Minsk Group, Paris
- Dennis Sammut, Director, LINKS (Dialogue-Analysis-Research), London
Chair: Galina Yemelianova, University of Birmingham
Speakers:
- Amanda Paul, European Policy Centre, Brussels
- Donnacha O'Beachain, Dublin City University
- Kamala Imranli-Lowe, University of Birmingham
Ambassador Jacques Faure is career diplomat. Until July 2014 Ambassador Faure had been a co-chair from France of the OSCE Minsk Group on the Nagorno-Karabakh. Prior to this Ambassador Faure served as Ambassador of France to Ukraine and some other post-Soviet states. In July 2014 Ambassador retired from civil service.
Dennis Sammut is a foreign policy analyst with two decades of experience of work in the Caucasus Region and other parts of the Former Soviet Union and the wider Middle East. He is the Director of LINKS (Dialogue-Analysis-Research), and a Member of the Advisory Council of the European Policy Centre in Brussels. He has previously served with the United Nations in Afghanistan, and as a member of the European Union's "Tagliavini Commission" on the war in Georgia and as a Trustee of the John Smith Memorial Trust. From 2012-14 he was co-ordinator of OxGAPS, the Oxford Gulf and Arabian Peninsula Studies Forumat Oxford. In 2007 he was awarded the OBE for his contribution to the prevention and resolution of conflicts in the South Caucasus.
Dr Domitilla Sagramoso is Lecturer in Security and Development at the Department of War Studies, King’s College London. She teaches researches and publishes extensively on conflict, security and development in Russia, the Caucasus and Central Asia. Her most recent publications is her book Russian Imperialism Revisited, London: Routledge, 2015.
Amanda Paul is a Policy Analyst and Programme Executive at the European Policy Centre (EPC, Brussels). She is responsible for managing EPC projects related to Turkey, the EUs Eastern Neighbourhood and the Eurasia region. She is also Associate Senior Research Fellow at the International Centre for Policy Studies in Kyiv, Ukraine. Her main areas of expertise include the South Caucasus, Turkish foreign policy, Ukraine, Eastern Partnership and European Neighbourhood Policy, Russia, conflict resolution (Cyprus and the former Soviet space) and geopolitical issues in the Caspian region.
Dr Donnacha Ó Beacháin is a Director of Research at the School of Law and Government, Dublin City University (DCU). He is a lead researcher in the €3.6 million FP7/Marie Curie Initial Training Network in Post-Soviet Tensions (2013-2017). He is also lead researcher and project coordinator in the €3.8 million Horizon2020 project on the Caspian region, which involves 19 partner institutions. He has researched and published extensively on ex-Soviet frozen conflicts and the role in them of the OSCE and EU. His recent and forthcoming books include The Colour Revolutions in the Former Soviet Republics: Successes and Failures(with Abel Polese, Routledge, 2010),Destiny of the Soldiers: Fianna Fáil, Irish Republicanism and the IRA 1926-1973, (Gill and Macmillan, 2010), Life in Post-Communist Eastern Europe after EU Membership(with Vera Sheridan and Sabina Stan, Routledge, 2012), Political Communication in Ireland(with Mark O’Brien, Liverpool University Press 2014) and The Irish Government and the Northern Ireland Conflict: The Politics of Partition(Manchester University Press, forthcoming).
Dr Kamala Imranli-Lowe is historian of the South Caucasus. She obtained her PhD from the University of Birmingham in 2012. In her thesis she researched 'The First Armenian Republic and its Territorial Conflicts with Azerbaijan.' Since 2014 she has been Research Fellow at the Centre for Russian, European and Eurasian Studies, POLSIS, College of Social Sciences, University of Birmingham. She has been researching the role of the Western framing in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. She has published extensively on history and contemporary politics of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Dr Galina Yemelianova is Senior Lecturer in Eurasian Studies at the Centre for Russian European and Eurasian Studies/ POLSIS, College of Social Sciences, University of Birmingham. She heads the University of Birmingham Research Group on the Caucasus and Central Asia. She researches and teaches on history and contemporary ethno-political and religious issues in the Caucasus, Central Asia and the Middle East. Her publications include Yemen under the Ottoman Rule, 1838-1635; Russia and Islam: A Historical Survey; Islam in Post-Soviet Russia: Private and Public Faces; Radical Islam in the Former Soviet Union and (as co-editor) Many Faces of the Caucasus.