Tweet
New Armenia Without Military Bases?
Naira Hayrumyan
Story from Lragir.am News:
http://www.lragir.am/engsrc/comments25334.html
Published: 17:38:34 - 03/03/2012
Yesterday the Heritage Party published the Resolution of New Armenia
which defines the foreign and domestic political priorities of
Armenia. The political party finds that Armenia must unite and change
the government to meet its domestic challenges.
As to foreign policy, the Heritage finds that the current Armenian and
Turkish border drawn by the Russian-Turkish agreements cannot be
recognized in the negotiations with Turkey. The territorial integrity
of Artsakh must be recognized. The party thinks it was a bad idea to
prolong the deployment of the Russian bases in Armenia.
In fact, the party thus set a benchmark for the other parties. Each of
them will have to express their standpoint regarding these strategic
issues. For the time being, the parties prefer not to publish their
standpoint or did not have one but the pre-election period requires
precision in approaches and standpoints on important issues.
The heritage raised the bar too high. In Armenia, no political party
has ever made an official statement on the prolongation of the Russian
bases in Armenia. Not because the parties are delighted about it but
because they are reluctant to appear as an adversary, fearing a
possible impact on their rating.
The standpoint of the Heritage is bold. In fact, this party has also
called for boycott of the unions initiated by Russia. The leader of
the ruling party Serzh Sargsyan demonstratively visited the
presentation of the book by Artashes Geghamyan, entitled Future of
Armenia - Eurasian Union and did not deny that Geghamyan may run on
the Republican list.
Hard though the parties may try to avoid pronouncements on the
relationship of Armenia and Russia, they will hardly succeed because
it is becoming a key issue. Armenia is zealously integrating with
Europe, at the same time the government signals the possibility of
joining Putin's Eurasian Union. What is the attitude of the parties
which will be running in the parliamentary elections? They must answer
that question before the elections.
So far the Armenian parties have observed the notorious
`complementarity', declaring balanced relations between Russia and the
West. They have been successful so far, though with obvious bias for
Russia. Tomorrow, however, the issue of the Eurasian Union comes
forth, they will have to forget about complementarity. And the
Armenian society must know the attitude of the party towards this
issue.
From: A. Papazian
Naira Hayrumyan
Story from Lragir.am News:
http://www.lragir.am/engsrc/comments25334.html
Published: 17:38:34 - 03/03/2012
Yesterday the Heritage Party published the Resolution of New Armenia
which defines the foreign and domestic political priorities of
Armenia. The political party finds that Armenia must unite and change
the government to meet its domestic challenges.
As to foreign policy, the Heritage finds that the current Armenian and
Turkish border drawn by the Russian-Turkish agreements cannot be
recognized in the negotiations with Turkey. The territorial integrity
of Artsakh must be recognized. The party thinks it was a bad idea to
prolong the deployment of the Russian bases in Armenia.
In fact, the party thus set a benchmark for the other parties. Each of
them will have to express their standpoint regarding these strategic
issues. For the time being, the parties prefer not to publish their
standpoint or did not have one but the pre-election period requires
precision in approaches and standpoints on important issues.
The heritage raised the bar too high. In Armenia, no political party
has ever made an official statement on the prolongation of the Russian
bases in Armenia. Not because the parties are delighted about it but
because they are reluctant to appear as an adversary, fearing a
possible impact on their rating.
The standpoint of the Heritage is bold. In fact, this party has also
called for boycott of the unions initiated by Russia. The leader of
the ruling party Serzh Sargsyan demonstratively visited the
presentation of the book by Artashes Geghamyan, entitled Future of
Armenia - Eurasian Union and did not deny that Geghamyan may run on
the Republican list.
Hard though the parties may try to avoid pronouncements on the
relationship of Armenia and Russia, they will hardly succeed because
it is becoming a key issue. Armenia is zealously integrating with
Europe, at the same time the government signals the possibility of
joining Putin's Eurasian Union. What is the attitude of the parties
which will be running in the parliamentary elections? They must answer
that question before the elections.
So far the Armenian parties have observed the notorious
`complementarity', declaring balanced relations between Russia and the
West. They have been successful so far, though with obvious bias for
Russia. Tomorrow, however, the issue of the Eurasian Union comes
forth, they will have to forget about complementarity. And the
Armenian society must know the attitude of the party towards this
issue.
From: A. Papazian