Author: Jane Topchian

In the “Pressing” program Satik Seyranyan the guest American-Armenian conflict expert, specialist in international conflict resolution and negotiations (Conflict Resolution, International Law, Mediation), Doctor of Law Hrayr Balyan.

Hrayr Balyan was one of the authors of the speeches of the 39th President of the USA, Jimmy Carter, he was in 2008-2022. was the director of The Carter Center’s Conflict Resolution Program.  He worked for the United Nations, OSCE/ODIHR and a number of prestigious non-governmental organizations and held leadership positions at the “Covcas Center for Law and Conflict Resolution” in Geneva, the International Crisis Group in Sarajevo and other institutions. In addition to his fieldwork, Hrayr Balyan practiced law in the United States and presented the details of his experience through lectures at a number of universities and academic institutions around the world. Currently, his subjects of study are the South Caucasus and the Levant.

Why is Nikol Pashinyan threatening the people, blackmailing them, threatening with war, even setting a deadline: if he is not re-elected, there will be a war in September, and now his teammates are saying that if there is no Nikol Pashinyan, there will be no Armenia.

The main theses of the interview are below.

• If we take an example from the already former prime minister of Hungary, Viktor Orban, who also told his people that if he is not elected, a war with Ukraine will start, we will see a different example. In Hungary, the people did not believe his words and voted for the collective opposition.

• War and peace do not depend on one person. They depend on various factors: Armenia’s defensiveness, Azerbaijan’s internal situation, the international situation… Pashinyan’s blackmail is only aimed at dividing and scaring the people. 

• I cannot say what is in his (Pashinyan’s, editor’s) mind, or whether he has an agreement with Azerbaijan or not, to specify the dates for the start of the war.

It is not right to go to the elections with threats of war. I can’t and I don’t want to guess what is in the mind of the prime minister, who is talking about a possible war if he is not elected.

• The peace agreement is only initialed, has no legal force and has many gaps. If it is signed in this form, it is a problem. In that document, there is no mention of the 19 hostages held in Baku, there is no mention of the occupied territories of Armenia. There are also other issues that do not exist in that initialed document.

• Azerbaijan not only makes demands before us, but also takes hostile steps towards us. The last one was the destruction of Stepanakert Cathedral by Azerbaijanis. Bad messages are coming from Baku։

• A peace treaty can be signed between two parties on a piece of paper, but in order to establish peace between peoples with that piece of paper, the issues between the two peoples must be resolved. Until these issues are resolved, there can be no peace. Peace established on paper is very easy to disrupt. As long as Armenian hatred does not retreat in Azerbaijan, there can be no peace։

• Today, the Azerbaijani army controls Artsakh and 7 regions around Artsakh. How many Azerbaijanis returned there?․․․ A few hundred?․․․ I consider the talk of 300,000 Azerbaijanis returning to Armenia to be absurd if they do not go to live in the territories under the control of Azerbaijan.։

To remind: Ilham Aliyev in 2025 on December 18 had announced, that 300,000 Azerbaijanis have appealed to the RA government to create conditions for their return, adding that they are still waiting for the RA authorities’ answer on that issue.

• Azerbaijan demands to change the Constitution of Armenia, Armenia does not present a similar demand, and in general the parties are in unequal conditions. The demands presented by Azerbaijan are opposed to the spirit of the peace treaty. Azerbaijan has already violated many points of the initial document. In this case, Armenia should also present demands: withdraw its troops from the occupied territories of Armenia, stop destroying the historical and cultural monuments of Artsakh, and stop the speech of Armenian hatred.

• Aliyev is keeping 19 hostages to humiliate us, to throw our dignity into the mud. Armenia’s concessions must end. Armenia should demand the return of the hostages։

• I saw the picture of Khor Virap in the new passports from the opposite side, so that Ararat cannot be seen… I think the next step should be to draw a curtain on the border so that Armenians cannot see Ararat։

• The change of the negotiator depends on the people’s vote. We will see how the people will vote on June 7.

• Today we are at a turning point in history when international and even local rights are being ignored by the superpowers and their allies. Even America advocates the use of force, ignoring international law. The war against Iran is a vivid example of this. Turkey is doing the same thing against the minorities inside its country, particularly the Kurds. Israel does the same. In all parts of the world, power decides. This started 10-15 years ago and is getting worse. I cannot say when we will return to the field of law. Against the power of others, we must oppose our power, not relying only on the right.

• Artsakh page cannot be closed. Only the displaced people of Artsakh can close that page, and they have no such intention. The people of Artsakh have the right to return, the right to own their property, and it is Armenia’s duty and obligation to help the people of Artsakh in this matter.։

• The Meghri issue was raised by Heydar Aliyev in the negotiations, when starting in 1999․–from to Key West, was negotiating with Robert Kocharyan. Aliyev proposed to replace Meghri with Karabakh and Lachin Corridor. The government of Armenia offered only to give Azerbaijan a way through the sovereign territory of Armenia. Let the Armenian government publish a document that a document has been negotiated to replace Meghri. there is no such thing, if there was, they would have published it։

• The offer to provide territory to Azerbaijan in Meghri came from the President of Turkey. Paul Goble took this and presented it as a program, which was brought into the middle in 1999․ during negotiations and in 2001․ During the negotiations of Ki Wiest.

• TRIPP is not Goble’s plan, it is different. The TRIPP document has many flaws, and we still do not know what benefits and harms it will bring us, until the details are negotiated, and we are not aware of it. As they say, the devil is in the details. I don’t want to praise Trump, but with TRIPP at least the war against Armenia was postponed.

• Armenia needs the USA to the extent that it has more than one million Armenian votes in America as voters.

• TRIPP is part of the Middle Corridor, and thus it is important for the countries of the region, including Iran, as well as for the USA and Europe.

• Next week, on May 4-5, the heads of countries participating in the European summit will be in Yerevan. This is a demonstration of support for Nikol Pashinyan. This summit cannot have any other advantage for Armenia. During those two days, Armenia will be in the center of international news, and both the government and the opposition should understand how to benefit from it. Can the opposition organize such demonstrations that the European leaders know that we have hostages in Baku, and until they are repatriated, there will be no peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan? Leaders of European countries should know and be ashamed, raise the issue before Baku։

• I will not be surprised that after the European summit, the pressure against the opposition will intensify in order to ensure the reproduction of Pashinyan.

• If one day negotiations on the return of Artsakh residents begin, the OSCE Minsk Group negotiation documents will be useless if there is not enough political will to use them.

• The pogroms of Sumgait, Baku, the ethnic cleansing of Artsakh are criminal crimes that have no statute of limitations. These claims have been presented, these claims are being examined in international courts, but the issues of withdrawing the claims are raised in the signed peace agreement, which is wrong. In that way, we will once again choose the path of force over international law։

• In one way or another, the leadership of Armenia tries to deny the Genocide, even blames the Armenian people for it, but the April 23 rally and the April 24 march to the Genocide memorial showed what the people’s opinion is about it.։

• Although it has suffered a lot of damage, Iran has emerged victorious from this war at this moment. Neither Israel nor the US achieved their goals․ Iranian statehood did not collapse. No matter how much the USA declares, the regime has not changed in Iran. On the contrary, more radical people have come to power in Iran. In today’s conditions The logic of TRIPP can be completely changed. 

• Armenia’s EU membership does not depend only on Armenia, but mostly on Europe. Until Europe resolves the issue of Ukraine, it has neither the time nor the desire to deal with Armenia.

• There was a very heavy atmosphere at the Putin-Pashinyan meeting, threat after threat sounded. Putin threatened Pashinyan with Armenia’s economic hardship. We should carefully approach issues with Russia. Armenia may find itself in a difficult economic situation if it is not prudent.

For the Armenians of Artsakh, it was expected that after Azerbaijan completely occupied Artsakh, it would do everything to erase the Armenian trace, because this is the handwriting of Azerbaijan. However, the RA leader’s statement that he will not try to make the issue of Azerbaijan’s cultural genocide a subject of discussion at the state level is incomprehensible and absurd for them.

Artsakh cultural heritage ombudsman, Caucasus expert Hovik Avanesov calls Nikol Pashinyan’s statement absurd, says that he represents an entire country, it is not permissible to say such things in public.

“These statements of Nikol Pashinyan and all the steps resulting from them fit into the logic of the so-called “peace” agenda, and declaring that they will not do anything against Azerbaijani crimes in order not to interfere with that agenda is at least diplomatic naivety.

First of all, there has never been and never will be a “peace” agenda in Azerbaijan, there are many proofs of this, starting from the cultural vandalism in Artsakh to the occupation of the sovereign territories of the Republic of Armenia.

These statements and steps of Nikol Pashinyan will lead to the fact that the cases of cultural genocide recorded in occupied Artsakh will significantly increase.” 168.amHovik Avanesov said in a conversation with

According to our interlocutor, Azerbaijan organizes large-scale events in the permanently occupied Artsakh, which are followed by the destruction and destruction of cultural monuments. Moreover, when people from different countries of the world go to Artsakh and give Aliyev some kind of award, Azerbaijan is more motivated by this and starts to act recklessly and destroy the Armenian footprint.

“I am afraid that if we do not stop all this, we will have a second Nakhijevan. And under these conditions, not making the issue a topic of discussion at the state level contributes to the promotion of that policy, which is, of course, unacceptable. Today, the opposite should have happened: any case of vandalism in Artsakh should have been reported at the state level.

While the government of Armenia is silent, the government of Azerbaijan is acting and accusing the Armenian side of committing cultural genocide. In other words, having at least such a parallel on the part of the Azerbaijani authorities, the approach of the Armenian authorities should have been different, a harsh response should have been given to all this,” added Hovik Avanesov.

According to him, not only the issue of the destruction of cultural monuments in Artsakh after 2020, but also all those cases that Azerbaijan carried out in Nakhichevan before that, when it razed an entire civilized culture to the ground, should have appeared on the international agenda at the state level today.

“Nikol Pashinyan’s statements are very dangerous and may have serious consequences for the works dedicated to the preservation of our historical and cultural heritage. This will further complicate the work of specialists dealing with the field, because when the problem is raised, the foreign delegate may retort that “if everything is correct, why is there no official response from RA?”

The Mother See of St. Etchmiadzin issued a statement and speaks about it on various international platforms, but the statement expressed by the Church is different, the official political statement is different,” said Artsakh’s cultural heritage ombudsman.

He said that regardless of Nikol Pashinyan’s statements, specialists and interested persons should continue to work actively to save the remaining monuments of Artsakh, otherwise, like the khachkars of Nakhijevan, all of them will disappear after a while.

“Of course, the work for us becomes more complicated under these conditions, but regardless of the created situation, otherwise the minor processes that are taking place today on this or that international platform may be stopped to our detriment. Moreover, I think that under these conditions we are obliged to multiply our efforts even more,” emphasized Hovik Avanesov.

Let’s remind that on April 23, Nikol Pashinyan said in a briefing with journalists that he is not going to make the policy of destroying cultural monuments in Artsakh by Azerbaijan a subject of discussion at the state level. According to Nikol Pashinyan, if they talk about this, a war will be started with Azerbaijan.

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“Five questions to the next Prime Minister Samvel Karapetyan. what will he do with a salary of 1 dram?  The series of interviews with the leader of the “Strong Armenia” party, philanthropist Samvel Karapetyan continues with Alik Aleksanyan, a member of the same party.

Samvel Karapetyan, referring to the arrest of Kandaz, a well-known detective from his team, responded: “Under this government, all patriotic people will be targeted. We must be ready when this government fulfills the demands of the outsiders, specifically Aliyev’s demands. All patriotic people are targeted. What Aliyev and Azerbaijan could not do in 30 years, the government of Armenia did it by their order, but soon, after our victory, the heroes will become heroes again.”

To the next question, whether you have any plans for the first session of the Government and how Samvel Karapetyan will spend his 1 dram salary, he answered:

“Since Pashinyan will not have a chance to receive bonuses after June 7, I will suggest that “varchabend” continue its activities, I will transfer 1 dram to “varchabend” every month. If, of course. accept it themselves, maybe they already have a lot of money?’

More details in the video.

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