Tweet
SPRING IN ARMENIA FRAUGHT WITH MAJOR UPHEAVALS
by Konstantin Yemelyanov
Politkom.ru
Jan 22 2010
Russia
The new year 2010 had a stormy start in Armenia. No sooner had the
New Year holidays ended than a parliamentary by-election was held
in Yerevan on 10 January, which, according to the opposition, was
once again flagrantly falsified by Armenian authorities. The person
that was declared the winner is a heretofore unknown candidate. He
competed with Nikol Pashinyan, one of the most prominent opposition
activists and editor of the Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper, who has been
in custody since the events of 1 March 2008...
On 11 January, the Dashnaktsutyun party held a rally protesting
against the ratification of the Armenian-Turkish protocols, and right
on the following day the Constitutional Court ruled that the protocols
largely complied with the country's Constitution. Leaping ahead, it
should be noted that on 20 January, the Turkish Foreign Ministry and
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed their protest over the
Constitutional Court's ruling, noticing "unacceptable preconditions"
in it and threatening to freeze the protocol ratification process
until the Armenian Constitutional Court revised its decision.
On 13 January, Erdogan left for Moscow and on 14 January, Russian
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov arrived in Yerevan. In those days,
Armenian Defence Minister Seyran Oganyan and NKR [Nagorno-Karabakh
Republic] President Bako Saakyan paid a visit to Moscow. Yet, no
information was available on meetings held by the former. On 16
January, a visit to Yerevan was paid Robert Bradtke, US co-chairman
of the OSCE Minsk Group, who on the same day met with the Armenian
president and the foreign minister and left for Nagorno-Karabakh
on the following day, 17 January, to meet with NKR President Bako
Saakyan. On 18 January, [Armenian President] Serzh Sargsyan flew
to Moscow on a one-day visit at the invitation of Russian President
Dmitriy Medvedev, and on 19 January, Armenian Foreign Minister Edvard
Nalbandyan received the entire team of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs.
On the same day, 19 January, a farce court trial of Nikol Pashinyan
was finished. Pashinyan was accused of organizing mass unrest on 1-2
March 2008 and sentenced to seven years in prison. "Judge Mnatsakan
Martirosyan passed an illegal sentence on Nikol Pashinyan, chief editor
of the Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper, and I view it as immorality,"
Lusine Saakyan, the lawyer defending Nikol Pashinyan, declared in
a conversation with a correspondent of News From Armenia-NEWS.am,
commenting on the sentence. "It was clear that justice has long
not existed in Armenia but passing such a sentence is immoral in my
opinion. The judge effectively increased the prison term demanded by
the prosecution. The defence will appeal against the sentence."
As Saakyan said, the sentence will be appealed with relevant courts.
Nevertheless, she does not consider it realistic to receive a fair
sentence in Armenia. This move, Saakyan noted, is intended to complete
the procedure with local court institutions and secure an opportunity
to go to the European Court of Human Rights.
The Armenian National Congress [ANC], for its part, issued a
declaration that said in particular: "The illegal verdict passed by
the court is yet another desperate attempt made by the regime to avoid
responsibility for the 1 March manslaughter, for the persecution of
thousands of citizens, for criminal falsification of elections. It has
proved that the regime does not intend to step back from its path of
increasing authoritarianism, lawlessness, and terror, thus pushing the
country towards an inevitable demise. This demise is inevitable for
any country whose constitutional system is replaced with a hooligan
regime, where laws and justice are violated, and where real criminals
try innocent people in court."
In fact, all events taking place in the country demonstrate that over
the past two years the regime, which came to power amid the bloody 1
March events, has been unable, or more precisely, unwilling to find
a common language with the opposition and stabilize the situation,
hoping instead to do it by force. Significantly, Galust Saakyan, one
of the most notorious leaders of the ruling Republic Party, shocked
journalists by openly supporting the sentence for the newspaper editor
and accusing Pashinyan of... killing 10 people.
The ongoing persecution of political opponents, "justified" by such
declarations, the unwillingness to detect and punish culprits in the
1 March tragedy, the unconcealed falsification of elections at all
levels, the cynical farce trials - all that proves that the regime
is perfectly aware of its illegitimacy and continues propping itself
with bayonets.
A significant factor in this situation is the fact that over
the same two years, the opposition Congress has become a large,
coherent, and organized political force. Since its formation, ANC has
captured a considerable and quite stable percentage of the vote at all
elections despite their completely falsified results. Even according to
official data, ANC's popular support has increased by several times,
amounting currently to about 40 per cent. In its entire history,
the Republic of Armenia has not seen such an organized, functional,
and competent opposition force of this level, and the authorities
understand it perfectly well, fear, and do their best to weaken
it. Yet, despite the attempts to break ANC apart and split it, the
organization continues strengthening its position, which is why the
regime feels increasingly unconfident.
An equally dramatic situation is also in the area of foreign policy.
In a bid to divert public attention from the manslaughter they
perpetrated in Yerevan streets on 1 March and to balance out their
position with support from the international community, the country's
authorities have been actively engaged in the process of settling
Armenian-Turkish relations, believing that such processes are as
simple and safe as, for example, football matches between school
teams. To no avail did the Congress try to bring their attention
to dangerous paragraphs that unexpectedly appeared in the initialed
Armenian-Turkish protocols. To no avail was a warning that an implicit
"mine" was planted in the protocols in the form of the refusal to
acknowledge the Genocide of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire at the
beginning of the past century and to pull out troops from the security
area in Nagorno-Karabakh. Serzh Sargsyan and his political team
authoritatively brought the protocols to the stage of signature and
clutched their heads only when the Turkish side declared loudly for the
whole world that further development of relations was only possible on
condition of "progress in the settlement of the Karabakh conflict..."
If you put together the spiral of foreign-policy events winding up
at a mind-boggling speed and the tense situation inside Armenia,
you will see quite an unsettling picture. In fact, the country's
authorities allowed others to drag them into a big geopolitical
risky game at a time when they, on the one hand, do not have popular
trust and, on the other, most obviously do not have a required set
of diplomatic instruments. If you add a brewing economic collapse -
with an economic decline of 18.3 per cent, more optimistic expectations
make no sense - you could confidently say that Armenia will soon see
very serious upheavals.
Speaking of the situation emerging in Armenia, one should note also
declarations by Smbat Karakhanyan, head of the Miabanutyun Armenian
National Club in Moscow, that a truly state system capable of defending
national and territorial interests, as well as the interests of
ordinary citizens, has not been established in Armenia. "The country's
regime itself was formed, through falsification and forcible pressure,
from representatives of oligarchs, the underworld, and outside
figures. It stands to reason that these groups serve the interests of
their masters and do not care about problems experienced by a majority
of the population, resorting to methods ranging from betrayal of
national interests to economic and financial machinations, including
speculation on the dram [Armenian currency] rate and cheating on the
quality of gas supplied to households for benefit of their groups.
There is no other explanation for the fact that top leaders of the
country and their family members own about 85 per cent of all national
assets and enterprises, including illegal and unaccounted operations,
and control almost 90 per cent of financial flows. In this sense, it
is easy to imagine the fate and real purpose of inter-state credits
they received," Smbat Karakhanyan emphasized.
The previous year in Armenia was notable for the fact that its
authorities indirectly encouraged artificial immigration among people
and an outflow of citizens from the country. The Armenian community in
Russia quite sensitively reacts to all vitally important processes
taking place in Armenia. It is no secret that despite a certain
decrease in private money transfers from Russia to Armenia, a huge
number of Armenian citizens still live on that money. Naturally, the
predatory and fraudulent methods applied in their country certainly
worry the [Armenian] citizens who work in Russia and send significant
amounts of cash to their families and loved ones in Armenia, and who
are not eager to see their money being pocketed by fraudsters in power.
In this context, Karakhanyan believes that the appearance in Russia
of such a project as the Information and Research Anticorruption
Centre [for] Crime Among Armenian Authorities should be quite planned
and expected. In his opinion, data cited in the Centre's research
documents, with some minor exceptions, are true.
Speaking of the Nagorno-Karabakh process, Karakhanyan stresses that
strange as it may seem, the only issue that Armenian leadership is
really interested in is whether external forces will help it stay in
power next spring.
The documents that should effectively become chapters of a framework
treaty between Armenia and Azerbaijan give practically no answer to
core questions, which started the whole conflict. As a technological
trick, they use the expression "self-determination" but do not
explain its essence or mechanisms of implementation. As for the
practical return of territories and real change of the established
system of security, [which is supposed to be] "great achievement"
but effectively is yet another verbiage connected with the use of
the expression "self-determination", this issue is fraught with yet
another round of escalation in the region.
In this case, one did not have to lock horns so uselessly and long
because any region in any state can initiate, in compliance with
international law and while ensuring work for a large number of highly
paid international bureaucrats, a long and fruitless procedure of
self-determination, being confident of the hopeless nature of this
effort. On the other hand, a notable feature of the current process
is that given the chosen format of effective information blockade,
it enables all the sides to interpret numerous "constructive and
positive meetings" in their own manner and in interests of their own
PR campaigns. Obviously, it is the process itself that is important
for the army of high-level international officials - the main thing
is to demonstrate dynamics. At the same time, it is already clear
for everyone that even procedural decisions are made in completely
different places and the probability of an armed conflict, too, depends
on their willingness to reach agreement and the degree of accords.
An alarming factor, Karakhanyan believes, is that the Armenian leaders
have increasingly adopted the position of US and Western centres,
which are inclined to turn a blind eye on all outrageous things that
are being done in Armenia and clearly contradict principles they
themselves proclaimed in exchange for obtaining control over the
discredited and compliant leadership, as well as buying some time in
order to increase their position in Armenia and more energetically to
push Russia out of various spheres of influence. This way, the regime
obtains yet another loophole for manoeuvring and soft blackmail in its
conversation with Russia, using these methods whenever a convenient
opportunity comes along. Many have long noticed that the Armenian
regime tries to make all of its repressive and illegal decisions
following visits to Russia and never forgets to express before cameras
extensive and incomprehensible gratitude to the Russian leadership.
Western political technologists duly appreciate such coarse and
unceremonious actions by dull-witted individuals, Karakhanyan believes.
Western diplomats have started to display strong activity in Armenia,
accompanying their visits with profuse promises to the population. A
noteworthy behaviour is that of OSC Minsk Group Co-Chairman Robert
Bradtke. The US co-chairman visited the region before the rest
co-chairmen (French and Russian) did. He managed, among other places,
to visit Stepanakert and make pledges to the NKR authorities. "I want
to assure you that in the new year the United States of America will
make every effort so that the people of Karabakh could have a peaceful
and good life in the future," Robert Bradtke said at a meeting with
NKR President Bako Saakyan. While in NKR, the co-chairman also pointed
out that the purpose of the current visit is to prepare another meeting
between Serzh Sargsyan and [Azerbaijani President] Ilkham Aliyev.
It is hard to say where the current regime may lead the country
but there is no doubt that events are already unfolding beyond its
control. In the opinion of some experts, only a resignation of the
top leadership and new and free nationwide elections can lead the
country out of the "zone of turbulence". At least, that would make it
possible to take a timeout and analyse the situation, and a legitimate
government would be formed in the country capable of operating on
the foreign-policy front without feeling a deficit of popular trust.
by Konstantin Yemelyanov
Politkom.ru
Jan 22 2010
Russia
The new year 2010 had a stormy start in Armenia. No sooner had the
New Year holidays ended than a parliamentary by-election was held
in Yerevan on 10 January, which, according to the opposition, was
once again flagrantly falsified by Armenian authorities. The person
that was declared the winner is a heretofore unknown candidate. He
competed with Nikol Pashinyan, one of the most prominent opposition
activists and editor of the Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper, who has been
in custody since the events of 1 March 2008...
On 11 January, the Dashnaktsutyun party held a rally protesting
against the ratification of the Armenian-Turkish protocols, and right
on the following day the Constitutional Court ruled that the protocols
largely complied with the country's Constitution. Leaping ahead, it
should be noted that on 20 January, the Turkish Foreign Ministry and
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed their protest over the
Constitutional Court's ruling, noticing "unacceptable preconditions"
in it and threatening to freeze the protocol ratification process
until the Armenian Constitutional Court revised its decision.
On 13 January, Erdogan left for Moscow and on 14 January, Russian
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov arrived in Yerevan. In those days,
Armenian Defence Minister Seyran Oganyan and NKR [Nagorno-Karabakh
Republic] President Bako Saakyan paid a visit to Moscow. Yet, no
information was available on meetings held by the former. On 16
January, a visit to Yerevan was paid Robert Bradtke, US co-chairman
of the OSCE Minsk Group, who on the same day met with the Armenian
president and the foreign minister and left for Nagorno-Karabakh
on the following day, 17 January, to meet with NKR President Bako
Saakyan. On 18 January, [Armenian President] Serzh Sargsyan flew
to Moscow on a one-day visit at the invitation of Russian President
Dmitriy Medvedev, and on 19 January, Armenian Foreign Minister Edvard
Nalbandyan received the entire team of the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs.
On the same day, 19 January, a farce court trial of Nikol Pashinyan
was finished. Pashinyan was accused of organizing mass unrest on 1-2
March 2008 and sentenced to seven years in prison. "Judge Mnatsakan
Martirosyan passed an illegal sentence on Nikol Pashinyan, chief editor
of the Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper, and I view it as immorality,"
Lusine Saakyan, the lawyer defending Nikol Pashinyan, declared in
a conversation with a correspondent of News From Armenia-NEWS.am,
commenting on the sentence. "It was clear that justice has long
not existed in Armenia but passing such a sentence is immoral in my
opinion. The judge effectively increased the prison term demanded by
the prosecution. The defence will appeal against the sentence."
As Saakyan said, the sentence will be appealed with relevant courts.
Nevertheless, she does not consider it realistic to receive a fair
sentence in Armenia. This move, Saakyan noted, is intended to complete
the procedure with local court institutions and secure an opportunity
to go to the European Court of Human Rights.
The Armenian National Congress [ANC], for its part, issued a
declaration that said in particular: "The illegal verdict passed by
the court is yet another desperate attempt made by the regime to avoid
responsibility for the 1 March manslaughter, for the persecution of
thousands of citizens, for criminal falsification of elections. It has
proved that the regime does not intend to step back from its path of
increasing authoritarianism, lawlessness, and terror, thus pushing the
country towards an inevitable demise. This demise is inevitable for
any country whose constitutional system is replaced with a hooligan
regime, where laws and justice are violated, and where real criminals
try innocent people in court."
In fact, all events taking place in the country demonstrate that over
the past two years the regime, which came to power amid the bloody 1
March events, has been unable, or more precisely, unwilling to find
a common language with the opposition and stabilize the situation,
hoping instead to do it by force. Significantly, Galust Saakyan, one
of the most notorious leaders of the ruling Republic Party, shocked
journalists by openly supporting the sentence for the newspaper editor
and accusing Pashinyan of... killing 10 people.
The ongoing persecution of political opponents, "justified" by such
declarations, the unwillingness to detect and punish culprits in the
1 March tragedy, the unconcealed falsification of elections at all
levels, the cynical farce trials - all that proves that the regime
is perfectly aware of its illegitimacy and continues propping itself
with bayonets.
A significant factor in this situation is the fact that over
the same two years, the opposition Congress has become a large,
coherent, and organized political force. Since its formation, ANC has
captured a considerable and quite stable percentage of the vote at all
elections despite their completely falsified results. Even according to
official data, ANC's popular support has increased by several times,
amounting currently to about 40 per cent. In its entire history,
the Republic of Armenia has not seen such an organized, functional,
and competent opposition force of this level, and the authorities
understand it perfectly well, fear, and do their best to weaken
it. Yet, despite the attempts to break ANC apart and split it, the
organization continues strengthening its position, which is why the
regime feels increasingly unconfident.
An equally dramatic situation is also in the area of foreign policy.
In a bid to divert public attention from the manslaughter they
perpetrated in Yerevan streets on 1 March and to balance out their
position with support from the international community, the country's
authorities have been actively engaged in the process of settling
Armenian-Turkish relations, believing that such processes are as
simple and safe as, for example, football matches between school
teams. To no avail did the Congress try to bring their attention
to dangerous paragraphs that unexpectedly appeared in the initialed
Armenian-Turkish protocols. To no avail was a warning that an implicit
"mine" was planted in the protocols in the form of the refusal to
acknowledge the Genocide of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire at the
beginning of the past century and to pull out troops from the security
area in Nagorno-Karabakh. Serzh Sargsyan and his political team
authoritatively brought the protocols to the stage of signature and
clutched their heads only when the Turkish side declared loudly for the
whole world that further development of relations was only possible on
condition of "progress in the settlement of the Karabakh conflict..."
If you put together the spiral of foreign-policy events winding up
at a mind-boggling speed and the tense situation inside Armenia,
you will see quite an unsettling picture. In fact, the country's
authorities allowed others to drag them into a big geopolitical
risky game at a time when they, on the one hand, do not have popular
trust and, on the other, most obviously do not have a required set
of diplomatic instruments. If you add a brewing economic collapse -
with an economic decline of 18.3 per cent, more optimistic expectations
make no sense - you could confidently say that Armenia will soon see
very serious upheavals.
Speaking of the situation emerging in Armenia, one should note also
declarations by Smbat Karakhanyan, head of the Miabanutyun Armenian
National Club in Moscow, that a truly state system capable of defending
national and territorial interests, as well as the interests of
ordinary citizens, has not been established in Armenia. "The country's
regime itself was formed, through falsification and forcible pressure,
from representatives of oligarchs, the underworld, and outside
figures. It stands to reason that these groups serve the interests of
their masters and do not care about problems experienced by a majority
of the population, resorting to methods ranging from betrayal of
national interests to economic and financial machinations, including
speculation on the dram [Armenian currency] rate and cheating on the
quality of gas supplied to households for benefit of their groups.
There is no other explanation for the fact that top leaders of the
country and their family members own about 85 per cent of all national
assets and enterprises, including illegal and unaccounted operations,
and control almost 90 per cent of financial flows. In this sense, it
is easy to imagine the fate and real purpose of inter-state credits
they received," Smbat Karakhanyan emphasized.
The previous year in Armenia was notable for the fact that its
authorities indirectly encouraged artificial immigration among people
and an outflow of citizens from the country. The Armenian community in
Russia quite sensitively reacts to all vitally important processes
taking place in Armenia. It is no secret that despite a certain
decrease in private money transfers from Russia to Armenia, a huge
number of Armenian citizens still live on that money. Naturally, the
predatory and fraudulent methods applied in their country certainly
worry the [Armenian] citizens who work in Russia and send significant
amounts of cash to their families and loved ones in Armenia, and who
are not eager to see their money being pocketed by fraudsters in power.
In this context, Karakhanyan believes that the appearance in Russia
of such a project as the Information and Research Anticorruption
Centre [for] Crime Among Armenian Authorities should be quite planned
and expected. In his opinion, data cited in the Centre's research
documents, with some minor exceptions, are true.
Speaking of the Nagorno-Karabakh process, Karakhanyan stresses that
strange as it may seem, the only issue that Armenian leadership is
really interested in is whether external forces will help it stay in
power next spring.
The documents that should effectively become chapters of a framework
treaty between Armenia and Azerbaijan give practically no answer to
core questions, which started the whole conflict. As a technological
trick, they use the expression "self-determination" but do not
explain its essence or mechanisms of implementation. As for the
practical return of territories and real change of the established
system of security, [which is supposed to be] "great achievement"
but effectively is yet another verbiage connected with the use of
the expression "self-determination", this issue is fraught with yet
another round of escalation in the region.
In this case, one did not have to lock horns so uselessly and long
because any region in any state can initiate, in compliance with
international law and while ensuring work for a large number of highly
paid international bureaucrats, a long and fruitless procedure of
self-determination, being confident of the hopeless nature of this
effort. On the other hand, a notable feature of the current process
is that given the chosen format of effective information blockade,
it enables all the sides to interpret numerous "constructive and
positive meetings" in their own manner and in interests of their own
PR campaigns. Obviously, it is the process itself that is important
for the army of high-level international officials - the main thing
is to demonstrate dynamics. At the same time, it is already clear
for everyone that even procedural decisions are made in completely
different places and the probability of an armed conflict, too, depends
on their willingness to reach agreement and the degree of accords.
An alarming factor, Karakhanyan believes, is that the Armenian leaders
have increasingly adopted the position of US and Western centres,
which are inclined to turn a blind eye on all outrageous things that
are being done in Armenia and clearly contradict principles they
themselves proclaimed in exchange for obtaining control over the
discredited and compliant leadership, as well as buying some time in
order to increase their position in Armenia and more energetically to
push Russia out of various spheres of influence. This way, the regime
obtains yet another loophole for manoeuvring and soft blackmail in its
conversation with Russia, using these methods whenever a convenient
opportunity comes along. Many have long noticed that the Armenian
regime tries to make all of its repressive and illegal decisions
following visits to Russia and never forgets to express before cameras
extensive and incomprehensible gratitude to the Russian leadership.
Western political technologists duly appreciate such coarse and
unceremonious actions by dull-witted individuals, Karakhanyan believes.
Western diplomats have started to display strong activity in Armenia,
accompanying their visits with profuse promises to the population. A
noteworthy behaviour is that of OSC Minsk Group Co-Chairman Robert
Bradtke. The US co-chairman visited the region before the rest
co-chairmen (French and Russian) did. He managed, among other places,
to visit Stepanakert and make pledges to the NKR authorities. "I want
to assure you that in the new year the United States of America will
make every effort so that the people of Karabakh could have a peaceful
and good life in the future," Robert Bradtke said at a meeting with
NKR President Bako Saakyan. While in NKR, the co-chairman also pointed
out that the purpose of the current visit is to prepare another meeting
between Serzh Sargsyan and [Azerbaijani President] Ilkham Aliyev.
It is hard to say where the current regime may lead the country
but there is no doubt that events are already unfolding beyond its
control. In the opinion of some experts, only a resignation of the
top leadership and new and free nationwide elections can lead the
country out of the "zone of turbulence". At least, that would make it
possible to take a timeout and analyse the situation, and a legitimate
government would be formed in the country capable of operating on
the foreign-policy front without feeling a deficit of popular trust.