EX-KARABAKH STRONGMAN RULES OUT ELECTION BLOCS
By Ruzanna Khachatrian

Radio Liberty, Czech Republic
Jan 18 2007

Samvel Babayan, the once powerful ex-commander of Nagorno-Karabakh’s
army, on Thursday dismissed reports that his Dashink (Alliance)
party is keen to form an electoral bloc with opposition forces.

"We will not join any alliances ahead of the elections to the National
Assembly," Babayan said. "We will contest them on our own."

He said Dashink is only prepared to include members of other parties
on its electoral slate.

Reports in the Armenian press have said that Babayan is interested in
teaming up with the Orinats Yerkir party of former parliament speaker
Artur Baghdasarian and another, smaller opposition party, the Union
for Constitutional Rights (SIM). The SIM leader, Hayk Babukhanian,
did not rule out such possibility last week.

In an interview with RFE/RL, Babayan said his party is aiming for a
strong showing in the upcoming elections and would not content itself
with a handful of parliament seats. "If we get, say, five percent
[of the vote] we will renounce parliament mandates," he said. "We
don’t want to enter the parliament with six deputies."

"We are joining the fray to effect change. The parliament must be
multi-polar," he added.

The 40-year-old retired general, who commanded the Karabakh army from
1993-1999 and was the territory’s post powerful figure during that
period, warned last June that he and his loyalists would not hesitate
to use force against those who would try to steal votes from Dashink.

But he was far more restrained on that score on Thursday, saying that
he "won’t blame anyone" if the elections are not free and fair. "That
would mean we haven’t done a good job," he said.

Babayan held the founding congress of his party in November 2005 just
over a year after his unexpected release from prison. He was serving
a 14-year prison sentence in Karabakh for allegedly masterminding
a botched March 2000 attempt on the life of the disputed region’s
president, Arkady Ghukasian. He never pleaded guilty to the charges.

Political observers suggested differing explanations for his
liberation. Some speculated that Babayan was set free in return for
agreeing to secretly cooperate with President Robert Kocharian and
his possible successor, Defense Minister Serzh Sarkisian. Both men
are natives of Karabakh.

"I am inclined to believe that the Dashink party is a pro-government
party," Aram Sarkisian, the leader of the radical opposition
Hanrapetutyun (Republic), said on Wednesday.

Babayan has repeatedly rejected such speculation, insisting that his
party is in opposition to Armenia’s leadership.