The number and memory of the victims of the 44-day war are not the subject of pre-election trade. Which one?

On May 15 168.am– “Important issues related to the 44-day war, which require a military assessment. What should have been done before the election campaign and what should not be done now? article: we published, where we noted that the reasons for our defeat in the 2020 war are not avoided in the internal political struggle by both the authorities and the opposition forces.

The observations here about some episodes are sometimes not quite true, that is, the assessments are purely political. Therefore, as we mentioned, within the permissible limit, the former military leadership of the 44-day military should have publicly answered several key questions in time, that is, there are questions that should be given a military assessment. Timely, because during the pre-election period they can become a reason for political speculation or be used against each other by political opponents. However, the reality showed that during the pre-election campaign, such speculations still happen, moreover, they are used are in order to get votes. In this case, we are talking about the number of victims of the 44-day war and whether or not to publish their names, which we also touched on in our above article.

And almost simultaneously with the publication of our article, NA President Alen Simonyan on Facebook straight air enters and once again mentions the official number of victims.

“Some rogue oppositionists in this pre-election period are trying to increase the number of our martyred heroes in an exaggerated way, and they say: more than 5,000, 6,000-7,000, up to 10,000. I have to say that this number is not true. That number in criminal cases of the 44-day war 3833, of which 78 are civilians, 3755 are military.

This number does not include the number of missing persons, it reaches approximately 160, and we cannot include them in this number for obvious reasons,” explained Alen Simonyan and referring to the request to publish the list of victims of the 44th day, he showed the location of the “Zinapah” foundation and even posted the link, noting that there are relatives and parents of the victims who did not want their names to be published.

We ourselves are not in favor of unjustified increase or decrease in the number of victims, regardless of who does it. But it is for this reason that many demand the official publication of the names of all the victims, especially when, as stated on the website of the “Zinapah” Foundation, we cannot find all the names. This is the first.

Secondly, there are people who have doubts whether they are Artsakh residents or occupied Those who have a passport with the code 070 of the Republic of Artsakh have been included in the published official list. These doubts may be subjective and unfounded, but it is a fact that there was no clear response to this.

Third, In November 2025, NA Speaker Alen Simonyan announced, that: “Died as a result of the 44-day war of 2020 3833 person including 78 civilians and 3755 servicemen”.

But the problem is that at the time it was listed as “unknown 191 the person’s location, including: 172 serviceman and 19 of a civilian”.

And now Alen Simonyan says: “The number of missing persons is approximately 160.”

But in March of this year, RA Minister of Justice Srbuhi Galyan answered the question of Garnik Danielyan, deputy of the “Hayastan” faction in the National Assembly: had informed.

“According to official data, we have 195 missing persons, 175 of whom are servicemen, and the rest are civilians.” 

Agree that “over 190” and “about 160” paint a different picture.

Yesterday, during his speech in Armavir, Nikol Pashinyan went even further demand from the opposition to prove that their number of 44-day victims is correct, although the government could very easily prove with arguments that the 5,000 number of 44-day victims is wrong.

“They started manipulating the number of victims of the 44-day war. They shoot numbers: 5,000 dead, and so on. I say, if Gagik, Robert, Samvel, and their team members do not justify and prove those numbers, I apologize a thousand times for using this expression, it is necessary to keep the equivalence so that some people do not lose their sense of smell. If Robert Kocharyan, Gago, Samo, Serge do not justify these numbers they used, and they cannot justify them… the people of Armenia will bring them to their knees in the election results for this attitude towards the memory of the martyrs. They must be brought to their knees. I myself, as a tribute, have knelt dozens of times in front of the monuments and memory of our martyrs, but none of them knelt,” Nikol Pashinyan continued.

As a result, Pashinyan makes the opposition’s hypothesis or calculation of the number of victims a subject of electoral trade. Is it moral?

Let’s assume that the opposition forces are also wrong and exaggerate the number (as we mentioned – any such speculation is not welcome), but ultimately the opposition is not responsible for the casualties in the war. In other words, they should not be elected to say the wrong number, but should the authorities directly responsible for the 3,833 victims in the 44-day war be elected a second time?

You will say that there is no war without victims.

In that case, let us remind you that in April 2022, Nikol Pashinyan from the NA podium announced  the following:

 “Could we have prevented the war that would have left us in this same situation, without the casualties, of course? This same situation with all the questions, all the nuances. There are things that I can’t say publicly now, because that would harm our future negotiations.”

In other words, there was a possibility of not having, for example, 3833 victims, doesn’t this imply responsibility?

By the way, in 2025 նոյեմբերի 19-ին Factor TV-ին տված հարցազրույցում Անդրանիկ Քոչարյանը նշել է. «Ես մի թիվ ասեմ՝ կբավարարի՞ Ձեզ՝ 3987»:

He responded to the rebuttal – where did you get that number from? “And where did the Investigative Commission come from? Everything is written in the report. It is not written with names and surnames, but at any time, since the digitization process is completed, it will be available with names and surnames for those who want it. If I say a number, it means that there is a name behind every number.”

Gegham Manukyan spoke to us later had said that the Investigative Commission, as a summary, gave the general picture of the victims, and that it does not correspond to the figures published by either Andranik Kocharyan or Alen Simonyan. At the moment, it is not known what number is in the report of the Investigative Commission, or whether the existing number has been changed, we will try to find out.

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