frozen conflict

Formation of the concept

The term appeared after the dissolution of the USSR. When the Soviet Union broke up in 1991, the former union divided into fifteen sovereign states and a number of de facto states; the de facto states that emerged from frozen conflicts experience a distinctive instability in Russia's 'near abroad'. The concept has been used mainly to describe protracted ethnic conflicts in the post-Soviet space, but has often been applied to other long-running and unresolved territorial disputes as well.

In frozen conflicts reconciliation is temporary, because hostilities frequently resume, and the frozen-conflict structure allows Russia to control outcomes when states try to leave its orbit. Such conflicts are not free of the agendas of the parent state or of external patrons.

Frozen conflicts are structured by the interests of the parent state and by intervention from outside great powers. After 2014 Russia denied Ukraine's territorial integrity and attempted to occupy new territory, damaging its authority as the 'gatekeeper' of the Black Sea region and weakening its influence over frozen conflicts. A characteristic of frozen conflicts is that outside intervention keeps the dispute in a structured state.

Parties and international-political character

Frozen conflicts give rise to internationally unrecognised de facto states and separatist governing structures, which is directly bound up with questions of intervention, recognition and blockade by neighbouring states and international organisations. Transnistria is an unrecognised separatist republic while Moldova continues to claim the territory, and the 'Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus' in the north of Cyprus is recognised by no state other than Turkey.

Some assessments hold that a frozen conflict, because the aggressor has not been defeated, can be seen as appeasement and even as a reward for aggression. The 'Status Quo of Aggression' may result from a deadlock produced by the balance of military power, and may in particular make great powers hesitate to take immediate military action against one another.

Distinctions

Despite the word 'frozen', a frozen conflict does not mean a situation with almost no political or military activity; it is a 'festering' conflict that can escalate again at any time. Nagorno-Karabakh was a frozen conflict with repeated rounds of full-scale escalation, and the war in the Donetsk region developed as a frozen conflict after the Minsk II agreement of 2015 before Russia's full-scale invasion in February 2022 ended the frozen state and expanded it into a hot war.

A frozen conflict is commonly distinguished from a 'hot war'. On Ukrainian territory it is not a freeze but a hot war that is under way through Russia's full-scale invasion, and the February 2022 invasion dismantled the earlier ceasefire regime, ending the frozen status that the Donetsk region dispute had held since 2015 and expanding it into a hot war.

A frozen conflict is closely related to, but not identical with, the concept of a 'de facto state'. A frozen conflict designates the conflict situation itself, whereas a de facto state designates the polity that emerged as its result; after a freeze ends, the de facto state may persist or disappear, as the Artsakh republic of Nagorno-Karabakh disappeared in 2023.

A frozen conflict is also distinguished from a 'solved' conflict. Nagorno-Karabakh was classified as 'solved' after Azerbaijan's reintegration in 2023, reducing the number of frozen conflicts by one, but the unresolved questions of border delimitation and a peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan mean the risk has not entirely disappeared.

A frozen conflict is distinguished from the Cold War or long-term hostility: it began as a way of describing long-running ethnic and territorial conflicts in the former Soviet space after the USSR's dissolution, and today is applied to a broader range of unresolved territorial disputes. Adjacent concepts include 'cold war', 'cold peace' and 'protracted social conflict'.

Cases by region

Representative frozen conflicts in the post-Soviet space are Transnistria (Moldova), Abkhazia and South Ossetia (Georgia), and Nagorno-Karabakh (Armenia and Azerbaijan). As of the end of 2023, apart from the hot war on Ukrainian territory, there were four frozen conflicts, and Nagorno-Karabakh lost its frozen-conflict status in 2023.

The Abkhazia-Georgia and South Ossetia-Georgia conflicts produced de facto states inside internationally recognised Georgian territory. The 1991-92 South Ossetia war and the 1992-93 Abkhazia war were followed by the Russia-Georgia war of August 2008, after which Russian-backed South Ossetia and Abkhazia came to control much of northern and north-western Georgia in fact. Such interventions are sometimes interpreted as a Kremlin strategy to destabilise other post-Soviet states and extend Russia's sphere of influence.

After the ceasefire that ended the Transnistria war (1990-1992), the separatist republic of Transnistria, under Russian influence, controls the easternmost part of Moldova; the republic is internationally unrecognised and Moldova continues to claim the territory. As a result of the war in Ukraine, Transnistria has been isolated from economic and financial links with Russia, and the '5+2' negotiating format for settling the Transnistria conflict has been left in a state of virtual 'clinical death'.

Examples of frozen conflicts in Europe include the Cyprus conflict (frozen since 1974), Kosovo (frozen since the end of the 1998-99 war) and Transnistria. Northern Cyprus is under the de facto control of the 'Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus' but is recognised by no state other than Turkey. The status question of Kosovo has been frozen since the end of the 1998-99 Kosovo war, and in 2008 it declared independence from Serbia unilaterally.

Examples of frozen conflicts in Asia include the Korean peninsula (since the 1953 armistice), mainland China and Taiwan (since 1949) and Kashmir (disputed among India, Pakistan and China). The Korean War was deadlocked by the 1953 armistice but no peace treaty was concluded, so it never legally ended, and the DPRK and South Korea each claim authority over the whole peninsula while control is in fact divided along the military demarcation line. In Kashmir, India claims authority over the whole former princely state of Jammu and Kashmir and controls about 43 per cent, Pakistan controls about 37 per cent, and China controls the remainder.

An African example is Western Sahara. Since the 1991 ceasefire, control of Western Saharan territory has remained largely frozen, divided between the Kingdom of Morocco and the Polisario Front, with intermittent unrest such as the Independence Intifada occurring in between.

Ending and reshaping of freezes

One case of a frozen conflict ending is Nagorno-Karabakh. The frozen state that lasted from the early 1990s until 2020 ended with the 2020 war and Azerbaijan's reintegration operation in 2023; roughly 120,000 Armenian inhabitants fled and a territorial division of about thirty years was reordered. After the separatist Nagorno-Karabakh regime disappeared at the end of 2023, Azerbaijan from 2024 effectively completed the reintegration of territory that had been under Armenian control for about thirty years, and from April 2024 the withdrawal of Russian peacekeepers also began.

Nagorno-Karabakh was a frozen conflict accompanied by rounds of full-scale escalation, and the Artsakh republic was dissolved by Azerbaijan's offensive in 2023. Border delimitation and a peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan remain unresolved since 2023, and in this respect the end of Nagorno-Karabakh's 'freeze' is assessed as a reordering of the conflict landscape rather than a completed peace.

Abkhazia and Transnistria are cited as cases where frozen status has been maintained or reshaped. In Abkhazia Russia strengthened its military presence, including by building a naval base at Ochamchire in response to the expansion of Ukrainian naval capability in the Black Sea, while Transnistria has undergone isolation from Russia and reorientation towards European markets, leaving the separatist authorities in a position where they must cooperate with Chisinau. Transnistria has been isolated from economic and financial links with Russia, and Abkhazia and South Ossetia have remained the frozen conflicts most resistant to change despite the weakening of Russian influence in the South Caucasus.