ArmInfo.One could consider it beneath his or her dignity to respond to the claim and interviews by Armenia's Premier Nikol Pashinyan in recent months, which are full of falsehood and fraud, Armenia's third president Serzh Sargsyan stated in an interview on January 31.
"But two reasons have made me take up the challenge," he said.
The first reason is the premier's opinionated claims that he is fully informed of the negotiations.
"It is utter lies. It is impossible to read the documents and be fully informed of the negotiations, form a full picture. Even I cannot claim I am fully informed of the negotiations. Yes, I was negotiating, but it was Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian who prepared the negotiations, considering the subtleties at his disposal. How did it happen that we followed the right way at once, but they got what they got? And it is not for days or hours, but for years that we talked to people well informed of all the previous stages of negotiations," Mr Sargsyan said.
So how did they happen to get entrapped by Azerbaijan if they are perfectly informed of the negotiations?
"How did they happen to swallow the bait they were offered back in 2019 and accept that document as a basis for negotiations? For a whole year they did not reveal the process to Armenian society until Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov laid the cards on the table," Mr Sargsyan said. He is surprised at the Armenian premier's claims in his recent interviews. According to Mr Sargsyan, he heard the Azerbaijani president make similar claims back in 2008, 2009 and 2010.
"When I heard some excerpts from his [Nikol Pashinyan's] interviews about the Artsakh problem, I was just astonished as they contain the so-called 'arguments' I heard from the Azerbaijani president back in 2008, 2009 and 2010. I feel hurt because he cannot any longer put forward objective arguments that would afford us good opportunities to get status for Artsakh. And if he tries to put forward these arguments tomorrow, they will remind him of his own words," Mr Sargsyan said.
In commenting on the Armenian premier's claims about Mr Sargsyan's verbal promises concerning the Nagorno-Karabakh peace process, which had not been enshrined in any documents and had to be fulfilled in 2018 and 2019, Armenia's third president stated no verbal promises had ever been made.
"No verbal agreements. It is not our style - making concessions under verbal agreements and so on," he said.
The second reason is, according to Mr Sargsyan, that some thinking people and political forces of Armenia are disappointed.
"We have an atmosphere of disappointment, and their [the incumbent authorities'] statements, as well as those by Azerbaijan, that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict has been settled. I have come to state once again that Artsakh will never be part of Azerbaijan. And, despite the devastating war and capitulation, we have all the possibilities for that," Mr Sargsyan said. He is surprised at the premier's statements that Artsakh cannot be "completely Armenian" if Azerbaijanis are in its power structure.
"We are neither fascists nor racists to claim that the Nagorno-Karabakh Parliament must be formed of Armenians alone. That is, if it is not 'completely Armenian' it means it is not Armenian? Are Armenians alone are members of Armenia's Parliament now? What are we speaking of? If it is a manipulation, it is a failure. If it is ignorance, it is funny. And my words are, of course, a message to the international community, as, even after the devastating war, the co-chairs themselves spoke of the fundamental principles of settlement again," Mr Sargsyan said.
As to a remark that the co-chairs have not said anything for a long period, he said:
"I do not know. They have not said anything for a long period because no one is saying. Have you heard Armenian officials to clearly say: 'what about the Nagorno-Karabakh problem?' the most they are saying now is their referring to their own programme prepared before the war - or even after it. Why? Ashamed? Afraid? Or, as they claim, there are verbal agreements precluding such statements?"