ArmInfo. The third president of Armenia, Serzh Sargsyan, acknowledged the victory of the incumbent RA Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan in the recent early elections, but with a reservation.
Thus, in an interview with the BBC Russian Service, answering the relevant question, Sargsyan said in particular: "Yes, I believe that he won the elections, but there are many questions related to this victory." Among these issues, he named the change in the electoral code a month and a half before the vote, the use of administrative resources, arrests and searches of the bloc's activists, and threats. Referring to the outflow of the population from the country during his tenure in power, Sargsyan expressed his conviction that emigration and despair are the results of inflated expectations, opposition disinformation and the activity of external enemies.
"You know, expectations have probably surpassed reality, and such a disappointment arose. In the modern world, when everyone can at any second see how they live in Paris or elsewhere, this person may always have a desire to live in the same socio-economic conditions. We tried to explain to people that in 30 years it is impossible to build such a country, which was built for 200-300 years, "Sargsyan says. "The second [circumstance], I think, is that, of course, we had allies and partners, but there were also sworn opponents who had a great influence on public opinion. And in fact, they managed to turn people against the incumbent government," he adds. He insists that by the standards of the region, the country was developing rapidly and the impression of decline and stagnation is a deliberately created myth.
"Yes, the political forces that - I use this term - do not like us, the political forces that oppose us and are hostile to us, managed to create the impression that the country is not developing, it is experiencing regression, which had absolutely no connection with reality," - he emphasizes. "We have developed faster than the world economy. There are figures, facts. During my presidency, the average salary has tripled, the average pension has quadrupled," Sargsyan said. (According to the statistics committee of Armenia, the salary has doubled).
To a clarifying question - does he want to say that thousands of men from villages went to build roads to Russia under the influence of enemy propaganda - Sargsyan replied negatively: "No, I say that these people wanted to live better than our conditions dictated. They were forced to leave by the desire to live well. And yes, the forces you mentioned contributed to the formation of this desire to live better. It's not obvious? You know, Armenia is small country, and external influence on Armenia is much greater than on comparatively large countries, "the former president noted.