Chairman of the Public Council, Chairman of the National Democratic Union Party Vazgen Manukyan issued a statement, expressing concern about the indictment of former President Robert Kocharyan in the case of March 1, and then the arrest and indictment of CSTO General Secretary Yuri Khachaturov.

“Our party and I personally have been a tough opposition during the ten years of Robert Kocharian’s presidency, we have blamed the authorities on many issues, we have been against many decisions.

But I categorically disagree with the charges that have now been presented to Robert Kocharyan and Yuri Khachaturov, I consider them groundless, and the decision to detain them as dangerous, which affects the security of our state. A baseless accusation against people who played an invaluable role in our nation’s greatest military victory in centuries.

However, from a political point of view, what happened in 2008? on March 1.

Since 1996, presidential elections have always been marred by numerous frauds. They were the same in 2008. the elections. According to the results of those elections, according to official data, three of the candidates received overwhelming votes. Serzh Sargsyan – 52.8%, Levon Ter-Petrosyan – 21.5% and Artur Baghdasaryan – 17.7%.

In that sense, this was different from the situation in 1996, when the fight was between two people: the opposition candidate (41%) and the government candidate (51.3%). Moreover, in 1996 we submitted a huge, voluminous evidence base to the Constitutional Court. However, we did not announce that the candidate of the opposition won, but we demanded to randomly open 3 boxes from each electoral district, and if election frauds are detected, we should go to the second round.

A similar situation was created during the presidential elections of 2003, when the main candidates were Robert Kocharyan and Stepan Demirchyan. After the publication of the results, the people indignantly surrounded the CEC building, and under the pressure of the people, after the recount, a second round was announced.

During the 2008 elections, the evidence base of the opposition was very weak, and almost nothing serious was presented to the Constitutional Court, although it was clear that fraud had taken place. But since there were quite a few votes split among the three, the best political claim the opposition could make was to go to the second round. Instead, Levon Ter-Petrosyan announced that he won, got 60 percent and should become the president, then tried to fulfill his unconstitutional demand by all means. And since a large part of the people had quite significant dissatisfaction with the authorities, not only related to the elections, they took advantage of that dissatisfaction and inflamed it, permanent rallies began. The authorities tried to disperse these rallies.

That standard situation, which existed both in our country before and in other countries, suddenly transformed into a non-standard situation and got out of control. There were casualties on both sides: both the security forces and the protesters. Either there are two sides here, and both should be assessed, or there is a third party that tried to escalate the situation.

In any case, it is necessary to find out who started shooting, on whose order it was, and I think many unexpected facts may emerge. I cannot say whether it is possible to reveal it or not, but these mysterious cases must be investigated to the end. What is important for us is not only to evaluate Robert Kocharyan or Levon Ter-Petrosyan, but to understand how the standard situation, which was always repeated in Armenia, suddenly turned into murders, burning cars, smashing shops, etc.

Dear people, I understand the indignation you have towards all the previous authorities, towards the people who oppressed us and the republic, I understand the satisfaction you feel when some of them are punished. But everything should be done legally, without pursuing political goals and revenge.

Dissatisfied with the past, sometimes justified, sometimes unjustified, we must realize that since the founding of the Republic of Armenia in 1918, first under the leadership of the Dashnaktsutyun, then under the leadership of the Communists, the Armenian National Movement, and the Republican Party, over the years, with the efforts of our people, with all the mistakes, we have had big and small victories, a powerful state machine has been created, and we should not destroy it, we should improve it and move forward.

It is worrisome that now Armenia has become a theater of one actor, the counterweights are almost not functioning: opposition parties, non-governmental organizations, press, etc. It seems everyone is scared and waiting. This path will lead us to number 37, war and isolation in the international arena.”