Cool heads needed in Nagorno-Karabakh's long hot summer

They're the "peace" observers and NGO workers who are presently bracing themselves for more bloodshed on the contact line of Nagorno-Karabakh. This time last year scores died in the worst clashes in almost a decade.

Summer in this occupied region has proved to be anything but relaxing.

But this year there is a legal twist in the 27-year Nagorno-Karabakh saga that brings hope to the one million displaced people who long ago decided they had been forgotten by the international community.

But more tellingly for the future of this unresolved conflict, it found that Armenia, as the occupying force, exercises "effective control over Nagorno-Karabakh and the surrounding territories".

This is a blow to Armenia which has a portrayed Nagorno-Karabakh as an independent state; albeit an independent state recognised by no-one. It also means the government of the Armenian capital Yerevan can be held to account for what goes on under its occupation. The status quo just became harder to maintain.

And it strengthens the calls by MPs from 24 European nations for a fair trial for two alleged spies, convicted last year of murder by a "court of first instance of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic". Any claim to legitimacy by that court has now been seriously challenged.

While the ECHR ruling might well have changed the stakes in Nagorno-Karabakh, it is still far removed from the beleaguered peace process, of which we hear so little in the European media.

That's because the OSCE Minsk group has achieved nothing to date, powerless to enforce any of the international resolutions calling for Armenia's immediate and unconditional withdrawal.