PERHAPS SERGE SARGSYAN WILL BE GIVEN NO TIME TO RESIGN
Hakob Badalyan

Lragir.am
12:39:34 – 05/11/2008

Now when considerable foreign political developments have taken
place which related one way or another to Armenia, and Armenia has
one way or another participated in them, including the meeting and
declaration on the settlement of the Karabakh conflict, it is evident
what the foreign policy of initiative means about which the president
of Armenia Serge Sargsyan had stated. This initiative is in reality a
synonym to despair. In other words, having no resource for resistance,
even pause and neutrality, the government has to agree to any process
that will happen, the author of which will demand participation from
Armenia. In other words, the foreign policy of initiative which was
declared by the new government of Armenia means that whatever we
are told to do, we must do without thinking and having them repeat,
otherwise we may get to have serious problems.

Naturally, the government will have these problems because it is the
government that has no resource to avoid undesirable processes. It is
clear that in the case when you have to become an actor in the scripts
of others, the best and perhaps the optimal way out is to relax and get
pleasure, producing the impression that what you do is voluntary and
even at your own initiative. Like when, for instance, Serge Sargsyan
invited Abdullah Gul to Armenia, allegedly on his initiative. Then Gul
came and left, made statements, and Serge Sargsyan had nothing else
to do but to "clean up" the "mess" that Gul had made. In addition,
Gul still seems to be "making a mess". Serge Sargsyan who had come
up with such an initiative seems to be doing nothing else, perhaps
because he does not know what he should do. It turns out that either
the initiative stopped halfway or the other half of the script has
not been handed over to Serge Sargsyan.

Otherwise, it is difficult to explain why the Armenian side got stuck
in its field and cannot continue the initiative which was logically
expected to follow Gul’s visit. Moreover, the Armenian side even
seems to have realized that in reality everything was much of a trap,
therefore the foreign minister Nalbandyan states that if there must
be a process for the sake of the process, Armenia does not need that.

The current phase of the settlement of the Karabakh conflict is
also evidence to the desperate initiative of Armenia. It seemed
that Armenia needed that activity least of all, especially when the
Karabakh conflict has become almost a trump card in the struggle for
influence. In that case, the possibility of at least maintaining the
status quo through calm evaluation of the situation and sober decision
making, using the pause, has increases.

In other words, "initiate" as much as needed, but it is not clear
by whom and when it is needed, having a result which is unfortunate
for us.

And can Armenia avoid initiative? The current government cannot. The
point is that the current government lacks not only public, civil
but also government legitimacy. Serge Sargsyan is not only rejected
by the society, despite some primitive propaganda but also does not
control the government.

The deficit of legitimacy of Robert Kocharyan, for instance, was not
less great than Serge Sargsyan’s but since Robert Kocharyan had almost
achieved perfection in control over the government pyramid and the
situation, he was able to resist external recommendations and proposals
and reject invitations for "initiatives". On the other hand, however,
there was no Popular Movement led by Levon Ter-Petrosyan during the
presidency of Robert Kocharyan, and the opposition was in a fruitless
quest for glory and money, which Kocharyan used, regularly helping
the opposition to get the glory or money, mostly money. In all the
other cases, the fact is that Serge Sargsyan does not control not
only the public but also the government pyramid. Maybe the dynamics
of foreign developments hindered his success, which did not give him
enough time to focus on internal problems, and using that zeitnot,
they push Serge Sargsyan to cross-initiatives in foreign policies.

One way or another, it is obvious that Serge Sargsyan has appeared in
a difficult situation. And the problem is not only that they demand
Karabakh from him. Moreover, he seems unable to meet that demand, which
aggravates his situation. The problem is that they seem to demand the
whole at once from Serge Sargsyan. In addition, they demand the whole,
using his vulnerability in all aspects. Finally, besides demanding they
do not let him take his time to become stronger and create resource
for avoiding those demands, at least through so-called democratic
reforms. Unfortunately, it seems possible that soon Serge Sargsyan
will not be given time for resignation when resignation seems to be
the only way out for both him and the state.