Political scientist to RA authorities: Why are you getting upset when  some territories of the Republic of Armenia are being given Azerbaijani names?

ArmInfo.Political scientist Hrant Mikaelyan has responded to the remarks made by the Speaker of the RA National Assembly, Alen Simonyan.

"When Alen Simonyan says, 'Karabakh belongs to Azerbaijan, why do you  call it Artsakh?': In that case, why are you upset when some  territories of the Republic of Armenia are given Azerbaijani names?"  This means a full recognition of the legitimacy of Azerbaijan's  territorial claims against Armenia. Let's unpack this statement.  Artsakh is the historical and political name of this territory, which  has existed throughout history as a region of Armenia and, in  particular, in the political sense, as a state - from 1991 to 2023.  That is, its mention is not at all tantamount to claims to  Azerbaijani territory. "The current [Armenian government] equates  Azerbaijan's political claims, expressed at the state level, with  public discourse and the statements of private individuals," the  political scientist noted.

He noted that Simonyan equates Azerbaijan's unauthorized,  plucked-out-of-air claims to the entire territory of Armenia with  talk of Artsakh, which is merely a region formally (by Stalin,  Aliyev, Erdogan, Pashinyan, Charles Michel, and several others)  attached to Azerbaijan. The authorities, as Hrant Mikaelyan noted,  are attempting to erase even the memory and any discussion of  Artsakh, not territorial claims or the restoration of Armenian  statehood in Artsakh. "The idea of "exchanging" the Artsakh issue  for "Western Azerbaijan" that appeared out of nowhere has already  failed: Aliyev refused to play this game and rejected Pashinyan's  proposals when the latter proposed to renounce Artsakh in exchange  for renunciation of "Western Azerbaijan". Let me also remind you  that Pashinyan renounced the real "birth certificate" / "cadastral  document" of Armenia - the Declaration of Independence - in favor of  partial and temporary recognition by Azerbaijan. In particular,  Aliyev said a week ago: "We have many reasons not to recognize the  territorial integrity of Armenia, but we are ready to take this step  for the sake of peace and the future of our relations. But I cannot  guarantee that in six months our position will remain the same."  Thus, recognition is insincere, short-lived and does not solve any  issues of long-term security for Armenia. But allegedly, Artsakh was  surrendered for this. What is really going on? Aliyev put forward  another demand "on the path to peace" - make all Armenians forget  about Artsakh, not "mention Artsakh so that the refugees don't dare  remind them that they must return to Artsakh, otherwise there will be  war. And given that Pashinyan has done nothing to strengthen  Armenia's security, this argument always works. And "for the sake of  peace" we must agree to one more condition. 

The problem is that there have already been dozens of them, and with  each successive one, Aliyev can put more and more pressure on  Armenia, and Armenia has fewer and fewer tools to resist," the  political scientist emphasized.  And when all the tools for  resistance are exhausted, the next demands will be: give us  territory, evacuate the people, let our people in, share water, give  us control of the mine, and so on. Oh, what was I talking about? This  has all happened before. There will be more, just further away,  deeper, closer to Yerevan. That's all there is to it."