FLEXIBLE AND BARBARIAN
168 Zham
Nov 12 2009
Armenia
Yesterday at the meeting of the Armenian National Congress (ANC)
activists, the first president of Armenia, head of the Pan-Armenian
National Movement, Levon Ter-Petrosyan, made a lengthy speech. He
dwelled on domestic political situation in Armenia after the signing
of the Armenian-Turkish protocols and made his predictions about
possible developments.
It seems to me that the following scenario will take place. The
Turkish parliament will delay the ratification of the protocols or
they will ratify them with some reservations tending to promote a
quick settlement to the NK [Nagornyy Karabakh] conflict. The Armenian
parliament will adopt a wait-and-see policy and will get back to the
ratification of the protocols only after Turkey ratifies them.
The international community will consider the NK issue as the main
obstacle to this deadlock and will make efforts to speed up its
settlement which completely coincides with Turkey’s position. Pointing
to confrontation between Armenia and Diaspora over the signing of
the Armenian-Turkish protocols, Serzh Sargsyan will ask the mediators
to hold back the NK conflict settlement for some time explaining to
them that it will be difficult for him to withstand to yet another
confrontation.
The international community will admit Sargsyan’s explanation with
understanding, but they will not miss the opportunity to use his
weakness and therefore, they will reject his request. Moreover, they
will increase pressure on Armenia over the NK. It is quite probable
that the interested forces will also convince Armenia to ratify the
protocols first substantiating that after that it will not be easy
for Turkey to delay the ratification process.
Thus, based on this logic, the developments in the forthcoming months
will head in the direction of the NK conflict settlement rather than
in the direction of the Armenian-Turkish relations because the main
condition of the Armenian-Turkish reconciliation is not the genocide
issue but the Karabakh issue settlement. And despite the beginning of
his speech, L. Ter-Petrosyan had mentioned that it is not intended
to be part of his programme, he raised a lot of issues. The first
president of Armenia finished his speech with a rhetoric question which
would most probably become an issue of discussions and interpretations
quite soon.