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Vitaly Naumkin, director of the Institute of Oriental Studies
The South Caucasus lives in its own coordinate system, and each state is engaged in the solution to its own problems.
They are very peculiar. Armenia today has some priorities related mostly, of course, to the development, the definition of foreign policy orientation.
We know that Armenia has made its choice not in favor of Europe but in favor of the CU.
It was a difficult choice, given that a large part of the population supports pro-European, pro-Western parties, pro-Western tendencies.
There is still the problem of unresolved conflicts. Georgia is also undergoing a painful process.
And it is well that this painful process of revising Saakashvilis heritage includes slow normalization between Russia and Georgia.
And Azerbaijan is a very fast-growing state in the economic sense, which is very closely monitoring what is happening in the Middle East and includes jihadists in the number of threats to its security.
As Azerbaijan, contrary to the views of those who do not know the situation, is a state where there are Sunni Muslims, where there are jihadist groups, and on the other hand, a state that is very wary of the Shia influence of Iran, the political influence of Iran, which now in order to restrain this influence has started very close cooperation with Israel, including on the military-technical sphere.
In general, I would not say that the Middle East situation somehow greatly affects the internal processes in the South Caucasus. No, it doesn't.
There are some troubles there that maybe reflect the Arab Spring, but they are very limited.