This module is provides background context and guidelines for a class simulation of the United Nations Security Council. In this case, the Security Council is dealing with a crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh. The simulation is meant to help students understand the functioning of the Security Council, a key international organization involved in issue of global security. A second function of the simulation is to help students understand two rival theories of international relations: realism and liberalism. Following the background information is a description of the guidelines and goals of the Security Council simulation exercise.

Realists describe the world as one of anarchy. In an an arching international system, there are no institutions that have the ability to govern the interactions of states, and thus routine cooperation cannot be effectively enforced. Thus, under anarchy, states seek their own individual interests (especially security) and must help themselves. In such a world, realists predict that actors will seek to maintain a balance of power, either by improving their capabilities or making alliances with other actors. At its core, realism assumes that human beings are primarily driven by selfish motivations and only cooperate with each other for personal gain (or to avoid punishment).

In contrast, liberals believe human beings are naturally cooperative and peaceful. However, liberals recognize that anarchy is corruptive, causing states, like people, to compete with one another when institutional frameworks are lacking in their ability to provide rules and structures for interstate interactions. For liberals, the institutional context is critical. Unlike realists, who view international institutions as merely another arena for competition, liberals believe international institutions and international law can help shape a more cooperative and peaceful world. Additionally, many liberals believe that the spread of democracy will facilitate peace (this is known as the “democratic peace” theory). Other liberals believe that growing economic interdependence will make war less likely.

The United Nations (UN) was founded in 1946, shortly after the Second World War. Many hoped the UN would serve as a forum for resolving international disputes. The Security Council was a key part of the UN’s peacekeeping role. The Security Council was created as a small group of fifteen countries empowered to deal with issues that threatened international peace and security. If its members believe it necessary, the Security Council is empowered to authorize military force. But this can range from sending a small peacekeeping force to monitor a cease-fire, a more robust peacekeeping force to enforce a cease-fire, enforce a "no-fly" zone over a country, or go as far as to authorize full-scale military force (this is a very infrequent option). Of course, the Security Council can also choose to do nothing, create a commission to further study the situation, or delegate the handling of the crisis to a regional organization.

The Security Council includes five permanent members: China, France, Russia (formerly the Soviet Union), the United Kingdom, and the United States. These five countries also hold veto power—if any of the five permanent members votes “no” on a resolution, the resolution fails. This means that the Security Council must seek the consensus of the five permanent members. In addition to the five permanent members, the Security Council has ten other members states, elected for two year terms by the UN General Assembly. The current non-permanent members of the Security Council are: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brazil, Gabon, Lebanon, Nigeria, Colombia, Germany, India, Portugal, and South Africa.

The Security Council has authorized the use of force on various occasions, including the 1950-53 Korean War (when the Soviet Union boycotted the meeting and the seat dedicated to China was held by the non-communist Republic of China, or Taiwan) and 1990-91 Gulf War. These missions are often referred to as enforcement or peacemaking missions in which the UN uses the military might of its contributing members to confront a state that has abrogated international law. Most Security Council resolutions have resulted in peacekeeping operations, such as those currently ongoing in Sudan, Congo, Kashmir, Cyprus, Afghanistan, and Kosovo. Peacekeeping operations are generally tasked with enforcing ceasefires, inhibiting combatant parties from reengaging each other on the battlefield, and, at times, punishing states and rebel groups who do not adhere to the terms of the peacekeeping mission.

Although the Security Council has only fifteen members, it regularly invites other countries to join in discussions—particularly if they are parties to disputes under consideration.

Nagorno-Karabakh is a breakaway region of Azerbaijan, a former Soviet republic. In 1988, just before the Soviet Union dissolved, tensions between the ethnic Armenians (the majority group in Nagorno-Karabakh) and the government of Azerbaijan flared up. On December 10, 1991, Nagorno-Karabakh declared its independence from Azerbaijan and war broke out between Nagorno-Karabakh and Armenia (another former Soviet republic) against Azerbaijan. After an estimated 35,000-40,000 deaths and nearly one million civilian refugees, the war came to an end with a Russian-brokered cease-fire on May 12, 1994.

Map of Southern Caucasus

The vast majority of the population (about 95%) of the new Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR) is ethnic Armenian. NKR is not recognized as a sovereign state by any country (including Armenia) and is not a member of the United Nations. A key issue is that during the war Nagorno-Karabakh seized territories previously recognized as part of Azerbaijan, linking it to Armenia (previously Nagorno-Karabakh was completely inside Azerbaijan). Complicating the situation is that which is posed by Azerbaijan's Nakhchivan province, which is geographically disconnected from the rest of Azerbaijan and is located on the other side of Armenia.

Adding to the tension are broader religious and geopolitical conflicts in the region. Most Armenians are Christians while most Azeris are Muslims. Both countries are located in the mountainous Caucasus Mountains, a region that includes: Russia, Georgia, Turkey, and Iran. Relations between Russia and Georgia are particularly tense after Russia’s 2008 invasion of Georgia in support of two breakaway provinces of Georgia.

Skirmishes along the cease-fire line between Azerbaijan and NKR took place recently in 2008 and 2010. In March 2008, during protests in Armenia over the presidential election, fighting broke out in the Mardakert region, leaving a disputed number of casualties. Both sides claimed the other started the shooting, and Azerbaijan began mobilized its army. International mediation helped diffuse the situation. Two years later, in 2010, fighting broke out in two separate incidents (June and September) in the Mardakert region.

Neither country is a fully functioning democracy. Armenia was recently given a score of “partly free” (5.0) from the Washington-based Freedom House. Azerbaijan was recently given a score of “not free” (5.5) by Freedom House. Those scores are on par with the regional average:

Both Armenia and Azerbaijan are semi-presidential republics, but with most power concentrated in the chief executive. Neither country has a history of free or fair elections, and both have been dominated by nationalist leaders. The current president of Armenia, Serzh Sargsyan, is only the third head of state since 1990 and was only elected in 2008. Sargsyan was chairman of the NKR Self Defense Forces during the war and later served in key defense ministries for previous governments. The current president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, is the son of former president Heydar Aliyev (a former member of the Soviet Union’s Politburo, the country’s top political leadership). The Aliyevs have been in power since 1993, when the previous president was overthrown over criticism of his mismanagement of the war.

Within the region, only two countries potentially qualify as democracies: Georgia and Turkey. The current president of Georgia, Mikheil Saakashvili, is a US-educated lawyer and political scientist. He was first elected in 2004. He stepped down in 2007 during a political crisis, but was elected for a second term in 2008. He is known as a reformer with strong pro-US and pro-NATO views (Georgia hopes to join the US-led NATO alliance). Turkey is a parliamentary republic (with a ceremonial president). The current prime minister, Recep Tayyip Edrogan, has been prime minister since 2003, when his center-right Islamist AK party won the elections.

The two other major countries in the region are Russia and Iran. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia has struggled to become a Western-style liberal democracy. After Vladimir Putin, a former KGB agent, became president in 2000, Russia became increasingly more authoritarian. After Putin’s protégé, Dmitry Medvedev, became president in 2008, Putin became prime minister. Iran has been an Islamic theocracy since the 1979 Iranian Revolution, and sees itself as a leading power in the Middle East. During the presidency of Mohammad Khatami, Iran pursued economic and political reforms. These ended in 2005, after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a conservative hard-liner, won the presidency. Ahmadinejad was reelected in 2009. That election was highly contested and led to weeks-long protests by opposition supporters.

The immediate regional context is complicated and tense. Russia has been involved in a war against the breakaway republic of Chechnya, which is just north of Georgia, since 1992. That conflict has produced more than 150,000 deaths to date. In 2008, Russia briefly invaded Georgia in support of two Georgian separatist republics: South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The war sharpened tensions between Russia and the US, which tried to balance its rapprochements towards Russia with its friendship with Georgia. That war lasted only two weeks, but produced more than 1,000 deaths.

Iran and Turkey also have complicated interests in the region, and both see themselves as potential leaders of the Muslim world.

Although Iran has relatively good relations with most of its neighbors, much of its foreign policy is driven by US-Iranian tensions. Since the 1940s, Iran was a key Western ally while it was ruled by the Pavlavi dynasty. In 1951, Iranians elected Mohammad Mossadegh, a socialist, as prime minister. Mossadegh advocated nationalizing Iran’s oil industry (owned by US and British companies). In 1953, US and British intelligence carried out a coup d’état that overthrew Mossadegh. Lingering resentment contributed to the 1979 Iranian Revolution, which overthrew the last Shah of Iran. During the revolution, Iranian students seized the US embassy in Tehran and held its personnel hostage for more than a year. In 1980, Iraq (with US support) invaded Iran. The war lasted eight years and produced more than a million deaths. Since then, Iran has been suspicious of US interests in the region and has sought to forge allies across the Middle East and beyond. In particular, Iran has become the principal backer of anti-Israel forces like Hamas and Hezbollah. After a short détente during Khatami’s government, US-Iranian relations deteriorated in the wake of 9/11. The presence of significant US military forces in Afghanistan and Iraq have caused Iran to feel encircled by a new and robust American presence in the region. This worry is particularly aggravated by covert US support for Jundallah (Soldiers of God), a Sunni insurgency in eastern Iran.

Turkey has long been a key US ally in the region. Turkey joined the US-led NATO alliance in 1952 and has been seeking membership in the European Union since the 1980s. Despite worries following the landslide victory of the center-right AK party in 2002, Turkey has remained a democracy and US ally. Turkey maintains friendly ties with all its neighbors, with the notable exception of Greece, with which it has had occasional military clashes. Recently, Turkey has made clear that it intends to increase its regional profile. Many in the West see Turkey as a potential model of “Islamic democracy” for the region.

Another issue affecting the region is the uncertain status of Kurdistan. Kurdistan is not a formally recognized and sovereign territory. However, the demographic geography of ethnic Kurds spans parts of Turkey, Syria, Iran, and Iraq. The Kurds have been seeking the creation of an independent Kurdish state for decades. The Turkish government has been battling Kurdish insurgency since the 1980s, with more than 37,000 people killed. Furthermore, militant Kurdish organizations in Iraq and Iran have challenged their governments through rebellion in an effort to obtain autonomy and independence. In Iraq, an autonomous Kurdish region was established shortly after the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

The regional balance of power can be described in three different ways: military, demographic, and economic. These give us a sense of the relative “strength” of the various actors (states) involved.

The following table gives a summary of the military forces in the immediate region. Although Russia is the largest military power in the region, Turkey and Iran are near-rivals.

The following table gives a summary of the relative populations and economies in the immediate region. Again, Russia is the largest country, though Turkey and Iran also have large populations and economies. However, despite their differences in size, it is interesting to note that all the countries listed below have relatively similar levels of development, as measured by the United Nations’ Human Development Index.

Another way to look at the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh is to look more closely at the two key countries involved (Armenia and Azerbaijan) and see how they are connected to the global economy.

The following tables give a summary of Armenian and Azerbaijani global trade. It is interesting to note that Russia is a major trading partner for both countries, but both countries have a wide range of important trade partners around the world. Nevertheless, it is interesting that Armenia and Azerbaijan have weaker trade links within their region than they do beyond it.

This Security Council simulation requires 20 country “delegations” (these can be individual students or small groups of students). Besides the 15 UN Security Council members listed above, the simulation would include delegations from: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Iran, and Turkey. A suggested time frame for this simulation is to completely dedicate two weeks. This time would include a briefing of the situation (using the above materials), giving students time to quickly research their country assignment, and playing out their roles in mock Security Council deliberations held during class.

During the simulation, students should represent their assigned country’s interests and work together with other delegations to craft a Security Council resolution dealing with the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. It is recommended that students be given sample UN Security Council resolutions (these are relatively brief) to model. The students should be required to introduce the type of language and resolution goals that they believe should reflected in the resolution that is eventually agreed upon by the Security Council. This should be done in brief (two or three minute) presentations. As their country’s representative, the student should be coached to be strategic in their presented resolution language such that their proposals, if accepted, will more fully satisfy their country’s foreign policy interests while also satisfying enough other countries to be accepted by the Security Council. Each presentation could be followed by consultation sessions in which the country representatives can meet informally in a caucus session to discuss the nature of each proposal, and each country presenter should then have the opportunity to amend his/her proposal language to more properly reflect the political interests of others in an effort to have the proposal accepted. Each proposal should then be voted on in congruence with the Security Council’s rules of obtaining consensus support from the permanent five members and a majority of the remaining members of the Council. Once a pool of proposals have been accepted, Security Council members (with influence from those outside the UNSC) should be tasked with structuring the accepted proposals into a uniform resolution on which the UNSC will vote to accept or reject. The simulation should end with the adoption or rejection of final resolutions.

Below are links to the four UN Security Resolutions dealing with the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict from the UNHCR website:

Although the above materials provide a minimal background of the immediate context and key players involved in this conflict simulation, all students are expected to do their own research on the issue—as well as on their individual countries. A recommendation is to present the context information to students at least two weeks prior to the simulation, but then expect each delegation to submit a short (1-2 pages) position paper outlining their country’s policy and interest in the conflict (these may be more obvious for some countries than others, but a good rule of thumb is to look beyond the specifics of Nagorno-Karabakh to see if similar situations have affected that country in the past).

Because this is a crisis simulation, students will be given a false (but credible) scenario involving Nagorno-Karabakh. In other words, students are not trying to resolve a lingering territorial dispute—they will be asked to respond (in their role as country delegates) to a critical breach of international peace taking place within the context of the above information. If appropriate, additional “news bulletins” can (and should) be provided throughout the simulation (but no more than one per class period).

The text below is the first phase of the crisis simulation.

Day 1: Assassination of Azerbaijan President

A recent explosion in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, killed the Ilham Aliyev, the president of Azerbaijan, and several of his close advisors and other government officials. Reelected in 2008 with 87% of the vote, Aliyev was very popular. Azerbaijan’s prime minister, Artur Rasizade, has vowed to find the parties responsible and punish them. Azeri news media has been quick to speculate that NKR extremists were responsible.

Armenian officials deny any involvement in the incident, which they claim was the work of domestic Azeri dissidents. Nevertheless, they have placed their military on high alert and have mobilized units to the border.

The delegation of Azerbaijan has formally requested that the Security Council look into the matter and call on Armenian forces to stand down. The Azerbaijan delegation also reminded the Security Council of four previous resolutions that called on Armenian forces to withdraw from territories seized from Azerbaijan and held since 1994.

In the meantime, the commander of Azerbaijan’s air force, Major General Altay Madeiyev, appeared on the radio, informing the public that two squadrons of MiG-29 fighters are on ready standby and prepared to answer any provocations.