The third President of RA, Serzh Sargsyan, sent a congratulatory message on the occasion of the Republic Day, in which it is said:

“Dear compatriots,

I congratulate you on the Republic Day.

More than a century ago, May 28 became for our people not only a day of restoration of statehood, but also a day of value testing. The national consciousness, the will to live freely and with dignity did not allow adaptation, fear, weakness, division and all those diseases that instill hopelessness and defeat in the nation to rise up.

First of all, May 28 was a victory of the spirit, which proved a simple truth: strength is not measured only by the number of soldiers and weapons. To live in fear under the yoke of a foreigner is worse than to die, to live without a nation, to live without a country is a disgrace, and to live freely and with dignity in one’s homeland is a vital necessity. This is the deep meaning of the hard but decisive victories of Sardarapati, Bash-Aparan and Gharakilisa battles.

Eternal glory to those who restored independent Armenian statehood, from the military to construction workers, intellectuals and clergy.

Glory and honor to the national-state figures who personally established the First Republic.

Dear compatriots,

Today, we are once again standing at a difficult historical moment, when the capitulating authorities associated with the defeat in the war and the failure of the state administration, in the Republic Square, wasting huge state resources, cynically stage a military parade of the unresolved consequences of the war, thousands of victims, territorial losses, some occupied territories bordering the RA, thousands of displaced Artsakh citizens, prisoners suffering in Baku prisons, the missing and the vulnerable. in the conditions of the existence of the state border. This is an immoral political ploy to cover up the disastrous consequences of the war, the current deplorable state of the army, to forget the responsibility for it before the upcoming elections, and to provide scenes of self-promotion at the expense of state funds. In the background of all this, it is pointless to even talk about the content of that show.

The army is not a pre-election decoration, but the birth of our nation, the pride, the worthy child, but today, unfortunately, the abandoned child.

The upcoming elections are also an opportunity to change this situation. And I again call on our citizens to unite around one goal: on June 7, to say no to the force that has become a symbol of defeat, despair and degradation of national values, along with its satellites, to begin the restoration of the army, the strengthening of statehood and the positions of the Armenian National Church.

Only in this way will our people prove that they deserve the military parade of a state with a victorious army.”

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