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DASHNAKTSUTYUN CLAIMS ANOTHER REASON FOR GOVERNMENT EXIT
Astghik Bedevian
http://www.azatutyun.am/content/article/24546497.html
12.04.2012
Armenia - Armen Rustamian, a leader of the opposition Armenian
Revolutionary Federation, addresses a campaign rally in Yerevan,
10 Apr 2012.
The Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) pulled out of
the ruling coalition in 2009 not only because of strong objections
to President Serzh Sarkisian's policy of rapprochement with Turkey,
a leader of the opposition party claimed on Thursday.
Armen Rustamian, the de facto head of its governing body in Armenia,
said Dashnaktsutyun was also frustrated with the Sarkisian
administration's failure to carry out sweeping political and
socioeconomic reforms.
Dashnaktsutyun cited only "insurmountable fundamental disagreements"
with Sarkisian on Turkish-Armenian relations when it quit the
government in April 2009. The move came four days after the Armenian
and Turkish governments announced a "roadmap" to gradually normalizing
bilateral ties.
That announcement was in turn made one day before the annual April 24
remembrance of some 1.5 million Armenians massacred by the Ottoman
Turks during World War One. Dashnaktsutyun and other critics of the
ill-fated normalization process believe that the timing was meant to
make it easier for U.S. President Barack Obama to backtrack on his
2008 pledges to recognize the massacres as genocide.
"[Turkey] was only one of the reasons [for Dashnaktsutyun's
withdrawal,]" Rustamian told RFE/RL's Armenian service (Azatutyun.am).
"Seeing that despite being part of [ruling] coalitions we were
incompletely solving problems important to us, we decided to quit
the coalition."
Rustamian argued that his party therefore has a moral right
to criticize Sarkisian's track record in office during ongoing
parliamentary election campaign. "We are not dodging responsibility,"
he said. "We just want our detractors to be fair."
"After all, we had only 12-13 percent [of the vote] and we did many
things commensurate with that [share,]" added the Dashnaktsutyun
leader. "But we did not succeed because ... the dominant force, the
[coalition] majority did not accept approaches and arguments advanced
by us. They did not accept the need for changes because they did
not want to abandon the system which unfortunately remains our main
scourge to this day."
Dashnaktsutyun entered into a power-sharing deal with Sarkisian's
Republican Party and two other parties following the February 2008
presidential election and the ensuing deadly government crackdown
on the opposition. It received three ministerial portfolios in
Sarkisian's cabinet.
The party was also represented in the executive branch during much
of former President Robert Kocharian's 1998-2008 rule.
Astghik Bedevian
http://www.azatutyun.am/content/article/24546497.html
12.04.2012
Armenia - Armen Rustamian, a leader of the opposition Armenian
Revolutionary Federation, addresses a campaign rally in Yerevan,
10 Apr 2012.
The Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) pulled out of
the ruling coalition in 2009 not only because of strong objections
to President Serzh Sarkisian's policy of rapprochement with Turkey,
a leader of the opposition party claimed on Thursday.
Armen Rustamian, the de facto head of its governing body in Armenia,
said Dashnaktsutyun was also frustrated with the Sarkisian
administration's failure to carry out sweeping political and
socioeconomic reforms.
Dashnaktsutyun cited only "insurmountable fundamental disagreements"
with Sarkisian on Turkish-Armenian relations when it quit the
government in April 2009. The move came four days after the Armenian
and Turkish governments announced a "roadmap" to gradually normalizing
bilateral ties.
That announcement was in turn made one day before the annual April 24
remembrance of some 1.5 million Armenians massacred by the Ottoman
Turks during World War One. Dashnaktsutyun and other critics of the
ill-fated normalization process believe that the timing was meant to
make it easier for U.S. President Barack Obama to backtrack on his
2008 pledges to recognize the massacres as genocide.
"[Turkey] was only one of the reasons [for Dashnaktsutyun's
withdrawal,]" Rustamian told RFE/RL's Armenian service (Azatutyun.am).
"Seeing that despite being part of [ruling] coalitions we were
incompletely solving problems important to us, we decided to quit
the coalition."
Rustamian argued that his party therefore has a moral right
to criticize Sarkisian's track record in office during ongoing
parliamentary election campaign. "We are not dodging responsibility,"
he said. "We just want our detractors to be fair."
"After all, we had only 12-13 percent [of the vote] and we did many
things commensurate with that [share,]" added the Dashnaktsutyun
leader. "But we did not succeed because ... the dominant force, the
[coalition] majority did not accept approaches and arguments advanced
by us. They did not accept the need for changes because they did
not want to abandon the system which unfortunately remains our main
scourge to this day."
Dashnaktsutyun entered into a power-sharing deal with Sarkisian's
Republican Party and two other parties following the February 2008
presidential election and the ensuing deadly government crackdown
on the opposition. It received three ministerial portfolios in
Sarkisian's cabinet.
The party was also represented in the executive branch during much
of former President Robert Kocharian's 1998-2008 rule.