U.S. SENDS POSITIVE SIGNALS TO ARMENIA
Armen Tsatouryan
Hayots Ashkhar Daily
Published on March 27, 2008
And speeds up the process of appointing an Ambassador
After the presidential elections and especially the tragic events
of March 1-2, the statements made by a number of senior American
officials with regard to freezing some of the American programs
implemented in our country have given rise to certain problems in
the Armenian-American relations.
The threats of applying sanctions met with the rough counteraction
of our country’s leadership, and the official Yerevan made it clear
to the American side that regardless the stance of the "Millennium
Challenges" corporation, the programs envisaged within the frameworks
of its assistance will be implemented, and, if necessary, other sources
of funding will be found. Certainly, the US assistance programs are
still important for Armenia, however, it is necessary to keep in mind
that after a sustainable economic growth our country will already be
able to implement some of them at the expense of its own savings.
It is also necessary to keep in mind that taking into consideration
the century-old saying, "the holy place never remains vacant", Armenia
may, upon necessity, find other sources of foreign funding by virtue
of being situated in one of the world’s most sensitive regions.
However, it recently became clear that the US Administration has
started realizing that the program aimed at making a unilateral and
straightforward pressure on Armenia has no prospects at all.
Ter-Petrosyan had already accomplished his task, and the American
administration seemed to be initiating attempts of taking advantage
of its results and pushing Armenia to certain concessions. This
scenario of developments might have come true hadn’t President-elect
Serge Sargsyan paid a working visit to Moscow on March 24. Along with
Russia’s political support to the Armenian authorities, the visit also
heralded the beginning of the implementation of new Armenian-Russian
economic programs.
And thus, on March 25, just a day after Serge Sargsyan’s visit to
Moscow, Matthew Bryza made simultaneously two statements, one of which
bore a reassuring and the other – admonishing character. M. Bryza
made a "new" interpretation on State Secretary Condoleezza Rice’s
statement regarding the termination of the assistance programs to
Armenia after the events of March 1-2. "State Secretary Condoleezza
Rice spoke about the termination of some programs, and not about all
the US assistance programs directed to Armenia. However the necessity
of freezing the US assistance to Armenia may be eliminated since the
authorities of the country have made positive steps towards lifting
the state of emergency."
It is noteworthy that M. Bryza’s reassuring words were accompanied
by his inadequate interpretation on the Armenian President’s recent
statement on the possibility of recognizing the independence of Nagorno
Karabakh. The thing is that Robert Kocharyan had warned Azerbaijan
that if it pursued its policy of questioning the Minsk Group format
and transferring the Karabakh issue to the UN tribunal, Armenia
would, in response, choose to recognize the independence of Nagorno
Karabakh and provide the country with security guarantees. Whereas,
M. Bryza believes that in case of taking such an "asymmetric" step,
Armenia will rule out the possibility of negotiations."
It turns out that Azerbaijan may undertake "asymmetric steps" in the
United Nations, without meeting with an equivalent counteraction,
whereas Armenia has to make exclusively "symmetric responses".
This shows that both the task of continuing the American assistance
programs and the necessity of resuming the previous balanced approaches
will continue to be viewed by the United States as levers of influence
on the authorities of our country. That is, the pressures will
continue, acquiring a conventional and much more flexible character.
In this context, it is necessary to consider the prompt solution of the
issue of the candidacy of the new US Ambassador after the recent events
of Armenia. By the nomination of Mary Jovanovich who has officiated
in different CIS countries for many years, the Bush Administration
undoubtedly desires to have a strong and energetic ambassador in
Yerevan who will be able to work with the required consistency.
However, considering that the appointment of Ambassador is quite
a complicated protocol in the United States, and the country is to
hold presidential elections in November, the United States Armenian
lobby may also say its decisive word with regard to the confirmation
of Mary Javanovich’s candidacy. The whole problem consists only in
the issue to what extent the repetition of Richard Hoagland’s story
is advantageous to the Armenian side, considering that the United
States has not had an Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary
in Armenia for more than a year as a result of such story.
Thus, after lifting the regime of the state of emergency in Armenia,
the American administration expresses willingness to review the policy
it has been implementing in relation to our country following the
events of March 1-2. However, after the lame attempts of "lashing"
Armenia, as well as in the pretext of the obvious intention of
promising "pies" to Armenia, it becomes obvious that the Republican
Administration’s is seriously concerned over the prospects of the
further development of Armenian-Russian political and especially
economic cooperation rather than "satisfied" with lifting the state
of emergency in Armenia.