US AND EU UNLIKELY TO OSTRACIZE YEREVAN, DESPITE ELECTION WARNINGS
Emil Danielyan

EurasiaNet, NY
March 20 2007

The United States and the European Union are stepping up pressure on
the Armenian government to hold free-and-fair parliamentary elections
on May 12. They have warned that if the upcoming vote is deemed
fraudulent, Yerevan could forfeit hundreds of millions of dollars
in additional development assistance, and undermine its efforts to
forge closer links with the West.

However, analysts are skeptical that the warnings will have
much influence on the behavior of President Robert Kocharian’s
administration. The outcome of the parliamentary balloting will go a
long way toward determining the political futures of both Kocharian
and his most powerful associate, Defense Minister Serzh Sarkisian,
many Armenian political observers believe. Some say that neither the
United States nor EU is prepared to take the kind of action that would
seriously challenge the president’s nearly decade-long grip on power.

None of the presidential and parliamentary elections held under
the Kocharian administration until now were judged democratic by
Western monitors. The most recent of those polls, held in early 2003,
were marred by reports of widespread ballot box stuffing, voter
intimidation, vote buying, and other irregularities. [For background
see the Eurasia Insight archive].

US and EU officials say the upcoming elections offer a unique
opportunity for the South Caucasus state to end its post-Soviet history
of electoral fraud. "People [in the West] feel that there can be no
more excuses," said one Western diplomat in Yerevan. "The Armenian
economy is growing, and there is no active war in Nagorno-Karabakh. So
it’s time for Armenia to graduate into a normal political life."

Cory Welt, a senior Russia and Eurasia analyst at the Washington-based
Center for Strategic and International Studies, agreed, saying that
a clean election would give a "huge boost" to Armenia’s international
reputation. "As time goes on, there are [fewer] reasons, not more, for
Western states to promote engagement with an Armenian government that
seeks to rule through anti-democratic methods," he told EurasiaNet.

The issue was reportedly high on the agenda of Armenian Foreign
Minister Vartan Oskanian’s March 5 talks in Washington with US
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Top State Department officials,
including Rice, have repeatedly warned that if the forthcoming
elections again fall short of democratic standards, Yerevan will
risk losing $235 million in US economic assistance promised under
the Millennium Challenge Account (MCA), a program designed to spur
political and economic reforms in developing nations. [For background
see the Eurasia Insight archive]. Armenia was deemed eligible for the
scheme, unveiled by President George W. Bush in 2004, despite being
one of the world’s leading per-capita recipients of American aid.

Testifying before a foreign aid subcommittee of the US House of
Representatives on March 15, the head of a US government agency
administering the MCA, John Danilovich, said he "communicated" with
Kocharian earlier this year to reiterate Washington’s "concerns that
elections be held in a correct manner." One of Danilovich’s deputies,
John Hewko, visited Yerevan for the same purpose earlier in March.

"We expect to see significant improvement over past elections,"
Hewko told reporters there.

For its part, the EU is tying the proper election conduct to Armenia’s
participation in the European Neighborhood Policy (ENP) framework that
entitles the country, along with neighboring Georgia and Azerbaijan, to
a privileged relationship with the bloc, better access to its market,
and greater EU aid. Each of the three regional states signed with
the EU last November its own ENP action plan, each of which includes
provisions designed to promote democratization.

The EU’s Brussels-based special representative to the South Caucasus,
Peter Semneby, discussed preparations for the May polls with senior
Armenian officials during an early March visit to Yerevan. "It is
the first major election taking place in the South Caucasus after
we finalized the action plans," Semneby told RFE/RL. "And for that
reason it has an importance that goes beyond the borders of Armenia."

Failure to ensure its freedom and fairness would mean that Armenia
has lost an opportunity to build a "firm relationship" with the EU,
he warned.

Yet neither loss of the MCA funds, nor exclusion from the ENP would
threaten the political survival of Armenia’s two most powerful leaders
accustomed to Western criticism. Kocharian is believed to be planning
to hand over power to Sarkisian and remain in government in some
capacity after completing his second and final term in office in less
than a year from now. [For additional information see the Eurasia
Insight archive]. Continued control of the Armenian parliament is
seen as critical for the success of this putative scenario.

The US and the EU have so far left no indications that, in the event
of another deeply flawed election, they would openly challenge the
legitimacy of the authorities in Yerevan. "I don’t think the West will
take any sharp steps against Kocharian’s regime," Aleksandr Arzumanian,
a former foreign minister opposed to the current Armenian government,
told EurasiaNet. Arzumanian dismissed the Western incentives for
Armenia’s democratization, saying that they alone will not prevent
fresh vote rigging.

According to analyst Welt, Washington’s "only really significant
lever" is MCA aid and a "US stamp of approval" which it would give
to Yerevan. "Whether such US approval really matters to Armenia’s
authorities is another question," he said. "If they believe they
have sufficient support from countries like Russia and Iran, then
termination of MCA aid will mean little."

Another factor that may prompt the Bush administration to tread lightly
is connected with the long-running Nagorno-Karabakh peace process,
some observers believe. [For background see the Eurasia Insight
archive]. American, French and Russian diplomats who are trying to
broker a solution hope that Kocharian and Azerbaijani President Ilham
Aliyev will meet shortly after the Armenian elections and finally
cut a peace deal. Diplomats privy to the peace process say Aliyev and
Kocharian have already essentially agreed on the basic principles of
a peaceful settlement proposed by the mediators.

Washington, which has long held a Karabakh settlement to be a top
policy priority for the region, seems unlikely to undercut either
leader under the current circumstances.

Editor’s Note: Emil Danielyan is a Yerevan-based journalist and
political analyst.