ALEXANDER MANASIAN: “LEGAL FACTS BENEFICIAL FOR US FORCED OUT OF POLITICAL PROCESS IN KARABAKH ISSUE”

YEREVAN, APRIL 6, NOYAN TAPAN. The Republic of Nagorno Karabakh was
created in a territory that hadn’t belonged to Azerbaijan. Doctor,
Professor Alexander Manasian, the Chief of the YSU Theoretical
Philosophy Department stated about it at the April 5 meeting with
journalists, emphasizing that this fact, complete from the legal
side, must be observed as the basic one, making the international
norm of nations’ self-determination insignificant. “There is no
doubt that the Karabakh issue is internationally made political:
the problem is that our statesmen have thought since the 90ths that
using political tools means refusal of the legal facts. That’s why
all legal facts beneficial for the Armenian part were forced out of
the political process,” Professor Manasian mentioned. According to
him, both for political reasons and due the strength of the legal
factors, the argument of self-determination must be given less
importance than now. Besides, usage of the principle of nations’
self-determination is fraught with the danger that numerous countries
cannot definitely defend the position of the Armenian party, as they
have similar problems. Alexander Manasian invited one’s attention also
to the circumstance that Azerbaijan has lost moral right to pretend
on Karabakh. According to him, authorities of Baku have conducted
policy of genocide against Armenians of Azerbaijan, among them of
Artsakh during the Soviet years. This policy, obviously or disguised,
has been conducted in the way of economic and political persecutions,
finally being turned into blood-shed conducted in Sumgait. According
to the speaker, Azerbaijan continues the policy of Turkey in the issue
of Genocide: “We ourselves separated it into two issues, separating
the Armenians’ Genocide taken place in the Ottaman Empire from the one
taken place in Azerbaijan, whereas these are two stages of one and the
same Genocide, conducted by two Turkish states on the basis of the same
PanTurkish policy,” Manasian emphasized. According to him, even today,
when Armenians ar e going to mark the 90th anniversary of the Great
Genocide, this question is not raised and the Diaspora implements
lobbing only in the issue of recognition of the 1915 Genocide.