Category: 2018

New Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan participated in the 11-12 July Nato summit. A month after the [Velvet] Revolution, Nikol Pashinyan managed to have a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on two occasions: For the first time, within the frameworks of the Eurasian Economic Union summit in Sochi on 14 May and for the second time, at the 14 June opening ceremony of the World Football Championship. Against this background, many in Armenia perceived his arrival at the Nato summit as a step towards restoring a balance. However, in actual fact, this balance has never been disrupted.

Pashinyan’s visits to Moscow and Brussels fits quite well in the “multiple-vector” or “complementary” foreign policy, which Armenia has been pursuing over the whole post-Soviet period.

There was nothing new about attending the Nato summit: This was accepted practice even under the “old regime”. It can be said that Pashinyan is also doing the same, although in a new fashion. Thus, the unprecedented post-revolutionary situation has failed to make an impact on the country’s foreign policy.

The Sochi visit with post-Soviet leaders was a kind of “familiarisation”, while one of the reasons for attending the Nato summit was establishing contacts with Western leaders.

In the Armenian mass media and social networks, photos were published showing Pashinyan with [French President Emmanuel] Macron, [US President Donald] Trump, [German Chancellor Angela] Merkel, Canadian Prime Minister Justin] Trudeau, and other world leaders. However, behind the summit scenes, Pashinyan also managed to hold unforeseen introductory meetings with other leaders.

For example, during his meeting with Macron, Pashinyan and one of the officials accompanying Macron, who was Armenian by origin, greeted each other in an embrace, slightly breaching the protocol by doing so. These details are extremely important for the domestic Armenian public: This is perceived as a proof that strong world leaders perceive Pashinyan as an “insider”.

Things did not end in photos and embraces with fellow-countrymen. Pashinyan made several important statements, saying that the new Armenian leadership approached the foreign policy issue in a new fashion.

However, as regards geostrategic priorities, there are no particular changes: In his interview to Euroenews, Pashinyan said that Armenia was going to remain Russia’s ally, developing relations with the West and Nato at the same time and that among other things, Armenia was going to carry on participating in Nato missions in Kosovo and Afghanistan.

However, Pashinyan laid emphasis in a new fashion. Speaking about the problem of [Azerbaijan’s breakaway Nagorno-]Karabakh, Pashinyan said that Azerbaijan’s aggressive position regarding the new and democratic Armenia was aggression against democracy, which had won a victory in Armenia.

As regards relations with the EU, in this case, too, the strategy remains the same on the whole. However, in this case, too, Pashinyan laid emphasis in a new manner. Pashinyan said that democracy was a system of values, rather than a geopolitical orientation. He indirectly said that Armenia was going to build a democratic state and that at the same time, it wanted no conflict with Moscow.

Many positive assessments were made about the developments in Armenia during meetings with EU officials. However, as Pashinyan put it, the Armenian side held bigger expectations.

As Pashinyan put it, due to these changes, Armenia expected the EU to increase the amount of financial assistance [by 10m euros] [square brackets as published]. Ultimately, after Pashinyan and EU Ambassador in Armenia Piotr Switalski exchanged opinions in a tough manner, it was said that Armenia was going to prepare its proposals to the EU and that the EU was ready to consider them.

On the whole, the visit showed that in relations with the EU, the Armenian leadership was oriented on concrete results, rather than the process. Pashinyan said that changes would anyway be made in Armenia and that international organisations had an opportunity to make an impact on them. However, [he said] that they would be made even if there was no support and that Armenia was not going to be in the role of a petitioner.

Yerevan-Moscow

As I have already said, the Brussels visit was aimed to emphasise that Armenia’s foreign policy was multiple-vector.

During the first weeks after the revolution, some deviation to Moscow’s direction was noticeable in the foreign political agenda of Armenia.

From all appearances, the special attention was due to the fact that before the revolution, Pashinyan and his companions-in-arms were perceived as “pro-Western”, which caused fear in the Russian elite. From all appearances, Russia’s fear grew due to the fact that in Pashinyan’s cabinet, there appeared people, who had experience in working in NGOs and had received education in Western universities.

In some Russian media outlets, they focused attention on the fact that the new secretary of the Armenian Security Service, Armen Grigoryan, earlier worked in the Transparency International [NGO]. In Russia, the organisation is considered as a “foreign agent”.

Nevertheless, the programme, which was broadcast on Radio Komsomolskaya Pravda proved to be the most scandalous. During the programme, former TV presenter and currently Rosneft Vice President Mikhail Leontyev and his respondent spared no insulting pronouncements against Armenia. In the Armenian mass media, the programme caused a stir. The Russian ambassador in Armenia even had to make a statement. Indeed, episodes of the kind failed to create a trend and on the whole, the Russian media have preserved a neutral tone with respect to Armenia. However, it is also obvious that after the revolution, distrust in the new Armenian leadership was created in the Russian elite.

Given Armenia’s dependence on Russia in different spheres, starting with the military and ending with the economic sphere, if desired, Moscow can certainly cause serious problems to Pashinyan’s cabinet. To this end, it has quite a broad spectrum of instruments, including possible detection of dangerous substances in Armenian agricultural products and an increase in arms supplies to Azerbaijan.

Therefore, no leadership in Armenia – even the most revolutionary – can afford to confront Moscow. Pashinyan anyway needs Moscow’s loyalty and neutrality, particularly given his campaign for fighting corruption. It is difficult to say in which case Pashinyan will manage to preserve this neutrality. At least, no particular sympathy towards representatives of “the old regime”, who the struggle against corruption is targeted at, has been expressed in the Russian media so far.

The new Armenian leadership will anyway have to build a new model of relations with Russia. Being in opposition, Pashinyan repeatedly accused the Armenian authorities of sacrificing the country’s sovereignty and interests to relations with Moscow.

Now, Pashinyan has to show Armenian society that Armenia’s sovereignty cannot be subject to compromise and at the same time, he should not sour relations with the Kremlin. Finding a balance is quite a challenging task, particularly as due to the former authorities’ lobbying activities, this is becoming increasingly difficult.

Indeed, Serzh Sargsyan never earned particular trust on Moscow’s part: They thought that he wanted to “double-cross Moscow”, developing relations with the EU and Nato behind Moscow’s back. Nevertheless, due to his party background, Serzh Sargsyan was a more understandable person for Moscow than Pashinyan and his associates – yesterday’s oppositionist and NGO people – are.

Yerevan- Baku [and Ankara] [square brackets as published]

In addition to this, there is the factor of Azerbaijani lobbyism and ties between the two nations. In the Russian elite, [Azerbaijani President] Ilham Aliyev, who is a former member of the Political Bureau of the [Communist Party of the Soviet Union] and a graduate of the MGIMO [Moscow State Institute of International Relations], is considered as an “insider”, despite the differences over issues such as [going into] competition [with Russia] for gas supplies to Europe.

It was due to these lobbying efforts that several well-known Russian celebrities visited Azerbaijan. These were high-profile visits by well-known media personalities Maxim Shevchenko and Alexander Dugin. Apart from this, two MPs of the State Duma arrived in Azerbaijan to participate in the conference “Moscow-Baku Axis”, making pro-Azerbaijani statements. As expected, photos showing Shevchenko and Dugin with Azerbaijani military men caused a stir in the Armenian social media.

It is difficult to say whether Shevchenko’s and Dugin’s visits were coordinated with Moscow or not. However, episodes of the kind always cause a stir in Yerevan.

If Baku manages to secure trustworthy relations with Moscow, the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh might again escalate. In Yerevan, they fear that Baku might take advantage of Moscow’s distrust in the new Armenian leadership. So far, with the exception of several episodes, there has been no evidence that Baku is capable of winning Moscow over regarding the issue.

Presumably, Moscow should not be interested in the escalation of situation in Nagorno-Karabakh. At present, when the tensions are at the level of incidents, Moscow can turn a blind eye to this. However, if there is a serious escalation, Moscow will be faced with an undesirable choice between Baku and Yerevan: In that case, it will be impossible to maintain the policy of balance. Apart from this, the situation will deteriorate not only on the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh, but also in Armenia’s territory within internationally recognised borders, and the CSTO [Collective Security Treaty Organisation] will raise the issue of interfering. This will probably cause contradictions within the organisation.

And finally, at present, when relations between Moscow and Ankara have “thawed”, escalation of the situation in Karabakh does not play into the hands of either of them.

In the conflict zone proper, the station is currently quite aggravated. However, compared to perilous years, tensions are not as great as they used to be. Incidents on the front line and along the Armenian-Azerbaijani border have been part of Armenia’s and Azerbaijan’s everyday life at least since 2012, when the situation around the Karabakh issue became aggravated as a result of Ramil Safarov’s extradition [Safarov killed an Armenian officer in Budapest and was first convicted in Hungary and then extradited to Azerbaijan, where he was released]. Compared to 2014, never mind the April 2016 [war], the situation has been more stable even during the [Armenian] Velvet Revolution and afterwards.

At present, the worst thing is that incidents have become increasingly frequent on the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan’s Naxcivan Autonomous Republic. This territory is very close to Yerevan and at the same time, it borders with Turkey, which according to the Kars Treaty, is the guarantor of Naxcivan’s status.

Therefore, possible escalation in Naxcivan is fraught with the danger of losing control over the situation. Indeed, after the recent developments unfolding in Azerbaijan [the collapse of the power distribution system and also unrest in Ganca] [Square brackets as published], the level of risk decreased. On the other hand, in view of these developments, people in Azerbaijan might take interest in “winning a victory in a small-scale war”.

Although developments in neighbouring Armenia do not affect Georgia in any way, neighbours exist to make you interested in what happens in their country. In the meantime, what is happening there is quite interesting and instructive: New Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan is swinging wide a gigantic axe with all his might, which results in heads rolling on an industrial scale.

Arrests of corrupt officials necessary, but no guarantee of reforms

Taking into account that Armenia is a post-Soviet country with all defects characteristic of this area, he will have to swing the axe for quite some time to come. Incidentally, although the arrests of representatives of the previous government do show that intentions are serious, they nevertheless do not guarantee that any reforms will be carried out. A new broom has swept clean and in a new manner in the whole world in any century and in any era. Representatives of previous governments have always been foredoomed to travails in prison without any sympathy, but this has rarely led to any concrete results. Former high-level public officials have been arrested and others have occupied their places and everything has gone around in a circle.

Correspondingly, arrests we can now see in Yerevan are a mandatory but not the only condition, which ensures the dismantlement of the firm corrupt system Armenians revolted against. The example of Ukraine has shown that one set of corrupt officials may enthusiastically be replaced by others. Incidentally, the example of Ukraine is not quite correct, as no one has seriously been thrown into jail there, only into a garbage can [reference to Party of Regions MP Vitaliy Zhuravskyy, who was thrown into a garbage can in 2014]…

Russia interested in keeping ‘bandit, bureaucratic’ system unchanged

It is difficult to judge now what is going to happen next and how far-reaching Nikol Pashinyan’s plans are going to be. It is obvious that compared to Georgia of 2004, the corrupt Armenian elite will put up fiercer resistance. It should be born in mind that everything was so rotten during the last years of [late Georgian President Eduard] Shevardnadze’s rule that there was no one, who could put up resistance. All more or less important politicians scattered away, expecting austere men in leather coats to appear in their homes.

Unlike Tbilisi of 2004, the system in Yerevan of 2018 is keeping head down, preparing to resist, particularly as they have a powerful ally – Russia, which is interested in keeping a unified corrupt bandit and bureaucratic management system in all adjacent countries.

Young officials educated in the West, whose manner of thinking is not based on the criteria of rent-seeking and cheating, are Russia’s worst nightmare. Correspondingly, it will do all it can to keep the system unchanged. Taming Pashinyan is the Kremlin’s main objective in relations with Armenia.

However, let us leave Russia aside, imagining that it does not exist at all. Even without it, the objectives the new Armenian government is facing can drive anyone to a heart attack.

Two choices

It is known that reforms in a country consist of two parts – popular and unpopular. Nikol Pashinyan is now taking popular steps, throwing officials and criminals behind the bars. It has now come even to an ex-president [Robert Kocharyan arrested on 27 July]. People are all steamed up and the popularity of the strong leader is growing. At all times, people have watched with delight how formerly inviolable leaders were done away with. Taking into account the fact that the heads of those, who robbed the country a couple of months ago, wringing it out to prostration, are rolling with the use of belt conveyor system, there is nothing strange in the fact that Armenians like frequent arrests.

However, the number of heavyweight aces, who are to be arrested, will inevitably expire in a few months and people will also stop reacting. The popular part of reforms will end here and if Pashinyan really aspires to change the country, he will have to pass to the next stage – the unpopular one.

The opinion is widespread in the post-Soviet area that there are bad governments, foul oligarchs, and various kinds of bandits and at the same time, they are surrounded by people, who are warm and fuzzy and so elevated that they do not even step on the ground when walking.

Alas, Pashinyan and the whole of Armenian society will have to get first-hand experience to become convinced that the disease is universal and affects everyone. The new government will have to move deep into the depths and even if everything is all right when destroying large dark schemes built by the previous government and business, things will change when the punitive machine moves lower into the rank and file.

The Armenian artillery is now delivering localised strikes, but it will have to deliver blows on squares tomorrow and people are not likely to like this. The new team will have to put everything that was done improperly for many years and become habitual in the proper way, break small schemes, and rank-and-file and universal corruption. The attitude to such corruption is quite different. “People are trying to survive as they can,” [people usually say].

It is there that the hardest and uncompromising struggle awaits the incumbent Armenia government, a struggle with petty officials, who steal negligibly, the road police that takes negligible amounts of money from drivers.

They will effectively have to fight against the whole nation, who, like all others in the post-Soviet area, are accustomed to stealing negligibly [with thoughts like] “Oligarchs are of course, rascals, but we… We are not doing anything terrible, are we?”

It is on this wave of dissatisfaction that the existing system has a chance of revenge. Propaganda is going to be serious.

They will soon begin to hate Pashinyan and he will find himself between the devil and the deep sea: To extend reforms deep into the depths, break long-standing rules, and get fierce hatred from hundreds of thousands of people, who will be left without incomes, or to limit himself to arrests of top officials without aggravating relations with his own people and finally becoming hated because of having offered hopes and done nothing.

In short, Pashinyan will go down the drain anyway and it is up to him to choose: He must either become a dull politician, who no one will remember, when he departs, or go down in history as a reformer at the expense of hatred of most of his people.

Comparison with Georgian government

It is not an easy choice, but it is inevitable. There is no third option. The favourite Soviet _expression_ “do things without damaging anyone’s interests” is not going to come true. Our [Georgian]incumbent government is trying to achieve precisely this: To establish order without arresting anyone; to reduce bureaucratic expenses, leaving salaries unchanged; to build strategic hydroelectric power plants in a manner that will not anger local stupid people. As the [Russian] phrase goes, to both eat a roll and… [a scabrous ending follows] Well, you understood, what I mean…

The result is appropriate – nothing. And the Armenian government should also realise this. Everything is going to be decided in the coming few months. If the Pashinyan team goes into the depths and dares to touch the interests of “ordinary Armenians“, success is possible. If they follow the path of the [ruling] Georgian Dream [party], there is going to be no progress.

As the saying goes, you have to choose, but be cautious…

Second Armenian President Robert Kocharyan, who was arrested within the frames of the case of the dispersal of protesters in 2008, no longer has serious political influence and has never announced his participation in elections previously, political analysts have said.

Kavkazsky Uzel reported that on 26 July, former Armenian President Robert Kocharyan was charged with overturning the constitutional order by dispersing protests in Yerevan on 1-2 Mach 2008. The investigation petitioned for his arrest and the court ruled to arrest Kocharyan on 27 July.

“First, they want to isolate me from involvement in political processes and second, they want to say that they solved the 1 March [case]. However, what are they going to solve by doing so? There are no grounds for these accusations,” Kocharyan said in his interview to Yerkir Media [TV affiliated to the Armenian Revolutionary Federation – Dashnaktsutyun party – ARFD].

He also noted that he had said on many occasions previously that he was reluctant to return to politics. “However, this is a case, when it is not you, who is dealing with politics, but politics is dealing with you,” Lragir.am quoted the former president.

Kocharyan stressed in the interview that he had been writing a book over the past two years. It is autobiographic and it comprises the whole history of the recent years, including his personal conversations. It is going to be quite interesting, Armenian Report said.

Badalyan: Kocharyan has not announced his intention to run in elections

Robert Kocharyan preferred to speak about the forthcoming parliamentary elections to substantiate his statement on political reprisals, but he failed to specify whether he intended to participate in them or not, political observer Hakob Badalyan said.

“It is unclear how he can run in the elections and which political force he plans to participate in the elections with, whether he will create a party or will cooperate with one of the parties existing at the moment. A lot of things are unclear here. However, at least up to now, Kocharyan has unveiled nothing regarding elections,” Hakob Badalyan explained to Kavkazsky Uzel.

According to Badalyan, Kocharyan himself is soberly assessing his chances in case he returns to politics and prefers to be in the shade of a specific political force. “On the one hand, Robert Kocharyan may have financial resources. However, as we can see, the struggle against corruption is penetrating politics too. Therefore, Kocharyan’s chances are not big in this regard,” the political observer believes.

In addition, he said that Robert Kocharyan lost influence as a politician back in February 2015, when then Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan levelled accusations against the leader of the Prosperous Armenia party, Gagik Tsarukyan. The second Armenian president did not support Tsarukyan, although it was believed that Robert Kocharyan created the Prosperous Armenia party in 2006 in opposition to Sargsyan and the Ruling Republican Party [of Armenia – RPA] , the political analyst said.

He also pointed to the neutral position of the Prosperous Armenia party after Kocharyan’s arrest.

Support for Robert Kocharyan by politicians is linked to investigation into the criminal case, Hakob Badalyan believes. “Yes, Kocharyan was at the head of this system on 1 March 2008, but it was the mechanism as a whole that acted. Kocharyan showed in his interview that he was not acting alone and said very clearly that all responsible people should find themselves in the spotlight. In other words, he said that all of them were in one ship and he does not intend to sink to the bottom alone,” Badalyan said.

On the one hand, politicians realise that they are facing the problem of support, but on the other hand, they also realise that support for Kocharyan implies a conflict with society, “most of whom are very negatively disposed towards Kocharyan”, the political analyst said.

“There will nevertheless be people, who will support Kocharyan. However, they must understand what they are going to do if his guilt is proved, as it is about criminally liable actions,” Badalyan said with confidence.

Badalyan: No Kocharyan’s proteges remaining in power

Previously, Robert Kocharyan did not speak about his participation in the forthcoming elections, but the influence of the second Armenian president has significantly weakened, political analyst Armen Badalyan said.

As he said, today, Robert Kocharyan “is hardly as influential as he was 10 years ago, as a lot has changed in this country since then”.

“The political forces that have always been with him do not have the influence they used to have either. Therefore, only the ARFD and RPA have supported him directly or indirectly now. However, the RPA is in such a condition now that they need support themselves,” he explained.

“I do not think that the government viewed a real threat for themselves in Kocharyan, because he is not a force. He had supporters five years ago and representatives of the ARFD and RPA supported him directly or indirectly, but following the change of power in Armenia, government structures, including the judiciary and the power-wielding agencies, were completely cleaned of his cadres,” Badalyan noted.

He also said that politicians would not avoid Kocharyan, as he was “stigmatised with the 1 March case”.

Mehrabyan: Diaspora not to support Kocharyan

Ruben Mehrabyan, an expert of the Centre for Political and International Studies, described Kocharyan’s statement as “banal demagoguery”.

According to Mehrabyan, Kocharyan is trying to make the case political. “And he is politicising it in the context of actual politics, where his approval rating is equal to zero,” political analyst said with confidence.

The reason for that “is not only 1 March 2008, but also the economic policy that was aimed at handing over the whole potential under Russian control according to the ‘property in exchange for debts’ deal,” Ruben Mehrabyan explained to Kavkazsky Uzel.

Mehrabyan believes that the diaspora will remain indifferent and will not support Kocharyan. “At this moment, Russia may provide most powerful assistance, but given the incumbent government’s decisive actions, the support is not going to produce any results,” he said.

It is noteworthy that Hovsep Khurshudyan, a senior expert for economic and diaspora issues of the Armenian Centre for Strategic and National Studies (ACSNS), told Kavkazsky Uzel in 2008 that it was under Robert Kocharyan that Russia received the controlling stakes of the Iran-Armenia gas pipeline and the fifth power-generating unit of the Hrazdan thermoelectric power plant. In 2003, Armenia’s debt to Russia amounting to 93.760m dollars was annulled by means of handing over to the latter 100 per cent of the shares of five Armenian enterprises, including the Mars closed joint-stock company (estimated at 56.290m dollars) and the Yerevan Research Institute of Mathematical Machines (2.750m dollars), he also said.

Two parties accused the Armenian government of political reprisals against Kocharyan

On 27 and 28 July, the ARFD and RPA made statements, expressing concern about the accusations against former Armenian President Robert Kocharyan.

“The party welcomes measures aimed at establishing law and order and believes that the processes should unfold only within legal frames, without giving rise to various interpretations and political speculations. We regard bringing charges of overturning the constitutional order in connection with the ’21 March case’ against Robert Kocharyan as an alarming step, which can be interpreted as political persecution,” Kavkazsky Uzel quoted the statement by the ARFD.

The accusation “gives the impression of political reprisals and is absurd from the legal point of view”, the statement by the RPA says. “The situation that has taken shape is a threat to democratic development and a blow to the process of building a rule-of-law state. The politically motivated criminal case and the charges threaten constitutionality in Armenia,” the RPA statement said.

We would like to remind you that lawyers said earlier that the accusation against second Armenian President Robert Kocharyan was based on the testimonies of anonymous witnesses and was devoid of any concrete aspects and that the court disregarded his immunity. Kocharyan’s companion Viktor Soghomonyan described his case as political persecution, reminding of promises by Nikol Pashinyan, who ruled out political revenge and reprisals against opponents before he came to power.