Monday, August 7 2023 13:46

ArmInfo. Benjamin Matevosyan of the Political Economy think tank has commented on Artsakh  President Arayik Harutyunyan's overnight interview. The expert explained what Mr Harutyunyan "remained effectively silent about."  

Mr Harutyunyan's interview clearly shows the Artsakh authorities  (similarly to Armenia's authorities) are incapable of realistically  assessing the threats facing Armenia and Artsakh. Otherwise,  Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev's statements on the "Zangezur  corridor" in December 2021 would not have been perceived as "routine  pressure on Armenia in the negotiation process." 

"It has repeatedly been said that most of Armenia's political elite  are naturalists unable to assess threats until they face an  accomplished fact. So Mr Harutyunyan's statements and the Artsakh  authorities' actions after the 2020 war demonstrate 'dominance of  naturalists' in Nagorno-Karabakh," Mr Matevosyan said. 

Even Mr Harutyunyan, who "incidentally" thanked Mr Pashinyan during  his interview, admitted the fact that the blockade is the result of  Armenia recognizing Nagorno-Karabakh part of Azerbaijan. 

"Even Mr Harutyunyan actually admits that the undermined agreements  on unblocking the transport links are one of the causes of the  humanitarian catastrophe in Artsakh," Mr Matevosyan said.   

The document signed on November 9, 2020, was the basis of the new  security architecture in the region, which was a fundament for the  existence of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (NKR), with "postponed  discussions on its status" and security guarantees to the Artsakh  people by Russia, as well as a fundament for cooperation between  Yerevan and Baku, which, in turn, was supposed to form an acceptable  basis for further discussions of controversial issues between the  sides.  

"Many (primarily the branch of Russia's power in charge of the South  Caucasus) viewed Nikol Pashinyan as a politician able to implement  the points of the November 9 agreement. 

"However, after winning the early elections in 2021, Mr Pashinyan  launched a 'geopolitical reversal' process. As a result, he not only  recognized Nagorno-Karabakh part of Azerbaijan, but is going to 'tear  Armenia away from Russia' both in economic and in military and  political terms. He is doing it for the simple reasons that, relying  on one of the branches of Russia's power at his convenience, and  after being re-elected, Mr Pashinyan made a strategically accurate  assessment that, after implementing all the points of the November 9  agreement, he would stop playing any 'functional role' for Russia,  which, in turn, would cause his political transformation from 'a  state leader' into 'Viktor Yanukovich's neighbor.' The result was the  Western platform for negotiations," the expert said.   

Perfectly aware of the fact that no nation except for Russia is  capable of guaranteeing security of Armenia and, much less so,  Nagorno-Karabakh, Baku, after each round of negotiations in  Brussels/Washington increased its pressure on official Yerevan (for  example, the Brussels negotiations that preceded the hostilities in  Jermuk last September). The result is that, although Mr Pashinyan's  refusal to fulfill the commitments under the 2020 agreement allowed  him to remain in power in Armenia, Artsakh is now facing genocide and  Armenia a loss of its statehood after Artsakh falls. 

"Mr Harutyunyan's interview is nothing but a link is the chain of  horrifying events started in the autumn of 2020. Refusing to  implement the points of the November 9, 2020, agreement in the  'Armenia-Russia- Azerbaijan' triangle is an existential threat to  Armenia itself. But it is not a manifestation of an 'anti- Armenian  conspiracy'. Rather, it is the logical result of actions by some  individuals amid total silence/inaction on the part of those capable  of preventing what has been said above," Mr Matevosyan said.