ArmInfo. Second president of Armenia, head of the "Armenia" pre-election bloc Robert Kocharian sees the road to a dignified peace for Armenia exclusively through negotiated diplomatic methods, returning the negotiation process to the field of the international principle of the right of nations to self-determination.
Speaking at a press conference today, Kocharian noted that it is not about of resuming military decisions, not because the country is in a wrong state, but because it is generally wrong to talk about military solutions. The point is to return the issue to the field of the right to self-determination and to try to achieve certain successes by diplomatic means through the negotiation process. <This work will have to start from a very difficult starting point, but I see opportunities. I can't talk about 100% success or the top of these opportunities. But at the same time I see that the current authorities not only do not think about it at all, but in this matter they are showing complete hopelessness, and therefore it is impossible to connect any hopes with the authorities, "Kocharyan said.
The second president did not comment on the accusations against the first president, Levon Ter-Petrosyan, of an uncompromising position on Artsakh. I was the President of Armenia for 10 years, and there was not a single proposal from the co-chairs (OSCE MG, Ed. note), that Azerbaijan would agree to, and which Armenia would have dismissed, and this is a fact. With regard to all the proposals, we, albeit with some reservations, talked about the possibility of discussing them. Azerbaijan unambiguously refused and this is the best answer to the accusations of the first president against me," Kocharian noted. He stressed his disagreement with Ter-Petrosyan and that the key to the solution of the Karabakh problem lies with the Russian side. Kocharian expressed his conviction in the incorrectness of this approach, since this simply cannot be: there are parties to the conflict, there are those who are involved in it and there is an institution of co-chairs. It is clear that Russia is a key country playing an important role in this process, in this region, but to think that the key is in only one place does not correspond to reality.
Kocharian refused to comment on the third Trilateral Statement on the establishment of the Commission on the delimitation and demarcation of borders between Armenia and Azerbaijan, which is being prepared for signing, as it is at the stage of discussion, did not accept the final version, and may be revised. Moreover, Kocharian does not consider it right to get involved in this agenda, since the bloc has a lot of other pre- election work.
Kocharian, however, did not comment on whether he could have influenced the conclusion of a new trilateral statement, which talks about the delimitation of the borders between Armenia and Azerbaijan and whether he agrees with Pashinyan's position, who believes that the document is in the interests Armenia of 100%. Kocharian only stressed that there have been many such statements "about the interests of Armenia" in recent years, but for some reason there have never been these 100% coincidences. "Then we can already ask why, in this case, we found ourselves in such a sad situation. I can say with responsibility that during these three years not a single step has been taken that would proceed from the interests of the Republic of Armenia, especially from the point of view of ensuring its security, resolving the conflict or in the field of economic reforms. Nothing has been done in any area, "said the head of the <Armenia> electoral bloc.
Answering the question of how justified it is to hold elections when the enemy crossed the country's borders and is there no other choice, and why in such circumstances all the opposition forces did not unite into one bloc, Kocharian noted that if the entire opposition united into one force and went if together for the elections, would the citizens not have a question, how then to work and how to govern the country. "Then people would have the right to believe that our goal is to throw one person off, and not solve the country's problems. The format must be functional. And I cannot imagine the effectiveness of such a broad opposition format. We go to the elections to win and of course we think about how we will keep our promises and how to correct the situation," Kocharian said.