Former Armenian official urges immediate end to talks with Turkey, Azerbaijan

Former MP and National Security Service chief David Shahnazaryan claims the Armenian opposition sought to come to power rather than to oust Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and his team during its anti-government campaign last year.

“There wasn’t really a plan to remove the current government. There was a plan to come to power,” Shahnazaryan, who served as Armenia’s ambassador-at-large in 1992-1995, told Aysor TV in an interview on Monday, pointing to “intrigues” in the country’s domestic political life.

“It’s all intrigues. No one promotes Armenia’s interests. Some defend Russia’s interests, while others oppose it, thus trampling the interests of Armenia itself. The country’s interests are not defended today,” he claimed.

“As I previously said, our current national agenda requires an immediate end to all negotiations both with Azerbaijan and Turkey,” Shahnazaryan stressed.

Referring to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev’s statements at a panel discussion with Pashinyan in Munich on February 18, the ex-official stated they confirmed that the Armenian authorities had made “new concessions” to Azerbaijan, while Pashinyan “didn’t say a word about the occupied Armenian territories, Armenian prisoners of war held in Baku or call attention to Azerbaijan’s occupation of Artsakh.”

“I would like to remind you what I said back in 2019; many did not understand that Artsakh is the guarantor of Armenia’s security. The Artsakh issue has been closed by the current government, while Russia agrees with it. The only forum to discuss this issue should be the Minsk Group. It’s little likely amid the current geopolitical situation, but the Armenian authorities do not make any effort to that end, and we understand very well that Russia is against it. So long as the issue of Artsakh remains unresolved, no peace will be established here,” he said.