Category: 2022

This interview was originally published in Armenian by Mediamax on June 14, 2022. It has been translated for publication in the Weekly by Dr. Ara Nazarian.

Anahit Adamyan is the wife of Avetik Chalabyan, a co-founder of the Arar Foundation and a member of the “Consolidation” movement who was arrested on May 14.

Avetik Chalabyan and Anahid Adamyan in Tsaghkadzor, April 10, 2022 (Photo: Official Facebook page of Avetik Chalabyan)

Tell us about yourself. How did you meet Avetik?

I was born in Abovyan in a family of engineers. My mother is Russian, and we mainly spoke Russian at home, but my father categorically decided that we would go to an Armenian school. And at that time people sent their children to Russian schools, and in many cases, parents started learning Russian together with their children. But it was the opposite in our house. My mother studied Armenian with us.

I did very well in school, but historical subjects were not my favorites. I liked math. I graduated from Yerevan State University’s (YSU) Faculty of Economics, after which I studied at the American University of Armenia (AUA). Avetik and I met there, where he had also applied to the AUA following his work at the YSU Faculty of Physics.

It was impossible not to notice Avetik. He always had a habit of asking difficult questions, sometimes even in a positive sense, “upsetting” the lecturers. I noticed Avetik in the classroom for the first time, when the lecturer was trying to say something, and he was constantly asking questions, interrupting the lesson. I thought, who is this guy who is preventing the lecture from going on as planned. It turned out that we found ourselves in a common circle of friends; we even found out that we were born on the same day, a few years apart. Thus began our closer relationship. We have been married for 21 years and have four children.

What was Avetik’s family life like?

Avetik was born in Yerevan in a family of physicists and grew up in a very typical Yerevan environment in the yard of a multilevel building in front of the “Russia Cinema.” From a young age, he had various interests, even contradictory and seemingly incompatible. For example, he took both painting and boxing classes. But his greatest interests were Armenian, world history, military history and military strategies.

One of Avetik’s characteristics is being constructive and rational, which was also manifested when choosing a profession. His father says that things came easily to him where challenging problems were easy exercises for him. Realizing that he did not want to study theoretical physics, he changed his major and first studied at the AUA, then in 2001 he received his MBA from the University of North Carolina.

He is an exceptional person for me with personality traits that I have always admired. He is a knowledgeable, reserved and balanced leader whose opinion is valued by everyone. For many years, he worked in the Ministry of Economy of the Republic of Armenia. He has always excelled in effective negotiations, fair and impartial decision-making, reasoned debate and other important skills.

You lived in the USA for a while, then in Russia, but returned to Armenia. How did you make that decision?

We were studying in the United States and had no doubt that we would return. After living in the US for many years, Avetik received an offer from the Moscow branch of the consulting firm McKinsey & Company, triggering our move to Russia. We lived in Moscow for about 20 years, but never thought we would settle there permanently. We always knew that one day we would return. We spent the summer months here, and all four of our children grew up under the care of their grandparents.

While living and working in Moscow, Avetik always implemented pro-Armenian programs in Moscow, Armenia and in Artsakh. He took an active part in public life and implemented initiatives supporting young people, students and various other groups.

Through the efforts and initiative of Avetik and his supporters, the Aybik Educational and Cultural Center was established in Moscow, serving as a platform for new educational opportunities for Armenian children and closer ties with the Armenian community.

Then Repat Armenia was founded, the main goal of which is to unite the potential of the Diaspora and support repatriates. Many people who have returned to Armenia state that they made their decision to repatriate within the framework of meetings with Repat Armenia.

Why did Avetik decide to get involved in politics?

After the war in April 2016, many things changed for him dramatically. From that time on, he knew that a new war was imminent and that we must be prepared for it, militarily and physically and spiritually. The obvious danger on the one hand and the obvious inaction on the other caused significant pain for him. His programs aimed at Artsakh and the army expanded after the 2016 war and continue to this day.

He decided to get involved in politics from the second half of 2018 because he saw a gap and realized that, only in that way, could he have a meaningful impact. Before that he tried to help remotely, but there was a condition from McKinsey that he should either be involved in politics or continue his consulting activities. He chose to work for the homeland.

Avetik was born in Armenia, studied in the US and worked and lived in Russia. He has no dislike for any culture or politics. Most importantly, his vision and activities are pro-Armenia and pro-Artsakh.

If you follow his interviews or articles, you will see that unfortunately his predictions and warnings have come true. Today, he has a vision for the country’s development – build a strong and stable army that will serve as a deterrent to our enemies and take every effort toward building a strong military, sparing little toward that goal. He has explored means to cooperate with various entities, including the Ministry of Defense since 2016.

Of course, many of these programs and initiatives are not discussed publicly, but informed people are aware of them. Avetik was doing everything for the army, for Artsakh and Armenia, but there came a moment when everything started to collapse before his eyes, and he simply could not but fight based on his character and values. We were ready for any kind of difficulty. We discussed all possible developments, including arrest and pressure and agreed that none would be an obstacle, because Avetik’s motivation is patriotism, and his work is for Armenia and Artsakh.

An exclusive interview from the detention center with detained member of the “Unification” movement Avetik Chalabyan conducted by Koryun Simonyan from Oragir News on July 13, 2022 and translated by Dr. Ara Nazarian.

Avetik Chalabyan

Oragir News (O.N.): Mr. Chalabyan, the opposition movement, in which you also actively participated, is now limited to demonstrations once a week. According to many, it has died out. In your opinion, what mistakes did the opposition make during this time?

Avetik Chalabyan (A.C.): First, I would like to start with the fact that the opposition movement has recorded important achievements in all cases. First and perhaps most importantly, it brought our people out of the deep post-war depression into which the current government plunged them with its anti-national, defeatist propaganda, trying to present their orchestrated defeat of the 44-day war as proof of the collective incapacity of the Armenian people against the Turkish-Azerbaijani tandem. The majority of our people already realize that the defeat in the war is not a death sentence for the nation, as it straightens its back and is ready to defend its homeland, its dignity and legal rights. Secondly, the international players present in our region, as well as Turkey and Azerbaijan, realize that they are dealing not just with the puppet authorities in Armenia, ready to surrender any day, but have to reckon with an organized force that has the support of a significant, if not majority, of the population of Armenia and Artsakh. It is also expressed in the changes in their rhetoric and behavior, at least at the end of April when the opposition movement started, the enemies were no longer able to extract any open concessions from Armenia. At the same time, I do not think that the “Resistance” movement should be satisfied with what it has achieved. There are many years of confrontation with Turkey and Azerbaijan ahead, until more peace-loving and constructive regimes come to power in those countries, and we, Armenians, also need to have such a government that is capable of consistently protecting and advancing our national interests in such conditions. Therefore, we not only need to achieve the removal of the current government, but also to form a new government in its place, one that is much more competent, consistent, with military thinking and strategic thinking, capable of dealing effectively with the complex world around us. This is an issue for the next step of the struggle. 

O.N.: In your opinion, does the struggle have a new perspective on what needs to be done to restart with a new momentum?

A.C.: I think all this is not easy, but it is an imperative necessity to preserve the sovereignty of our country, to avoid the loss of our statehood. After all, we see how whole states are destroyed or become the theater of armed struggle for other large states in the world around us, which is heating up again as we are in a period of major military conflicts. This has happened in recent years in Libya, Syria, now in Ukraine, and today it threatens Armenia, which can become a small coin in the struggle between superpowers. We must prevent this, and this is possible only by forming a new quality government, which will base its activities on long-term national and state interests, will consistently deal with the modernization and strengthening of our country’s security system, and will be able to take advantage of the many available opportunities to strengthen our negotiating positions with Azerbaijan and Turkey. This requires the extreme mobilization of the political and organizational potential not only of Armenia, but also of all Armenians worldwide. This has been a fundamental failure by the current authorities based on their adventurous and dismissive actions; yet, its effective implementation today requires the creation and consolidation mechanisms and platforms for all those forces that, even if they have mutual differences in internal political issues, realize the dire nature of the external threats and are ready to cooperate to neutralize those dangers. In the coming months, this should be the main goal of the “Resistance” movement, especially to include the palette of forces included in it, such forces that previously did not actively participate in the movement due to the organizers, although they share the main agenda goals put forward by it. This, in turn, requires not a simple, mechanical meeting, but a series of public discussions in which different forces agree on the general agenda of the movement, the mechanisms for making tactical decisions, the logic of the movement’s actions, the principles of forming a new government in the future, etc. If this is done in an open, public and quality manner, it will in and of itself be an important stimulus for restoring the public’s interest in the movement and giving new momentum to the struggle. It is also very important to give clear answers to key questions that concern the public. For example, if you come to power, in the end, what will you do differently? What is the guarantee that you will achieve peace? At the expense of what factors? I think that we should now focus on clarifying those answers and delivering them to our citizens. That will be the main impetus to give new momentum to the struggle. 

O.N.: What are you doing that’s irritating Nikol Pashinyan to the point that he is detaining you for months?

A.C.: I think that this question should be posed to all those people who are illegally prosecuting me. Moreover, if it was not so obvious before, after the open court session on July 9-10, when the circumstances of the case were revealed to the public, and the judge made a decision clearly contrary to the letter of the law, I think there is no longer any doubt that the current government, abusing its control over the law enforcement system, is simply holding me hostage. My own opinion is that it has to do with two underlying factors. First, beginning in 2014 during the years when I was working abroad and in Armenia, we started carrying out public activities aimed at strengthening the army, and presumably I came under the attention of the special services of Azerbaijan. Back then, the government of Azerbaijan regularly wrote complaints to the international headquarters of our company demanding that I be removed from my position. From the moment I moved to Armenia, I devoted not only my public, but also my professional activities to the strengthening of the army and the defense system of Artsakh. My activities began to clearly annoy the leadership of Azerbaijan. Therefore, I do not rule out that there is a certain pressure on Armenia in this regard, and for the current government it is an opportunity to try to limit the part of my public activity which they really see as a direct threat to themselves. It is no secret that the government propaganda tries to justify its longevity by contrasting it with the previous ones and denigrating its various members, simultaneously trying to convince our public that the whole struggle is to keep what was looted in the past. Under these conditions, when new figures come to the public who were not directly involved in the activities of the previous authorities and are not responsible for their omissions in any way, they immediately begin to pose a significant threat to the existing authorities because they are capable of shattering the present-former dichotomy of convenience invented by them and and offer a quality, real and attractive alternative for our society. I think that in my case these two factors coincided, and perhaps that is why the current authorities are trying to pursue me with particular cruelty and cynicism. At the same time, I am sure that it will not bring the result they expected, and every illegal step taken against me will only increase the degree of responsibility of those who are guilty of it in the future.