DASHNAKTSUTYUN CRITICIZES THE MOSCOW DECLARATION
Lragir.am
17:43:31 – 08/11/2008
The next president of the United States Barack Obama has committed to
the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, which allows stating
that his policy will be aimed at the recognition of the
self-determination of Karabakh, thinks Kiro Manoyan, the head of the
ARF Dashnaktsutyun Bureau office of political affairs and hay dat, who
was hosted at the De Facto press club in November 8 for a debate with
the political scientist Hmayak Hovanisyan. At the same time, Kiro
Manoyan said that policy of Obama may be successful. `If no forces try
to instrumentalize the issue of Karabakh for their interests,’ he added.
In this connection, Kiro Manoyan mentioned the declaration of Moscow
which the presidents of Armenia, Russia and Azerbaijan signed on
November 2. According to the representative of the ARF Dashnaktsutyun,
there are several worrying things about the declaration: the signature
of Karabakh is absent, the declaration is not legally binding to turn
the point about the peace settlement into an imperative, and the
principles of Madrid are approved. All these make the declaration
unacceptable for Kiro Manoyan, and although he says that the absence of
a point on the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan is positive, the
Moscow declaration does not proceed from the settlement of the Karabakh
conflict but aims to increase the influence of Russia in the region.
According to Kiro Manoyan, the presidents of both Armenia and
Azerbaijan have signed the declaration because they do not mind the
increasing influence of Russia in the region.
Kiro Manoyan says an imitation of the settlement of the Karabakh
conflict is possible, but it will foster the improvement of the
Armenian-Turkish or Armenian-Azerbaijani relations rather than the
settlement of the Karabakh conflict. Kiro Manoyan thinks the Russian
initiative is actually a step towards the status quo, and Kiro Manoyan
says the status quo is favorable for us. He says the next U.S.
president Obama will not be against the influence of Russia because
actually he will not follow the Bush administration which tried to oust
Russia from the region.
The political scientist Hmayak Hovanisyan thinks the Moscow declaration
itself is not dangerous for Armenia. What is dangerous, according to
the political scientist, is the process of settlement which displays a
non-pro-Armenian tendency. Hmayak Hovanisyan says for years Armenia has
built its diplomacy regarding the settlement of the Karabakh issue on
Azerbajan’s negationism, that is Armenia accepted any proposal that the
OSCE Minsk Group offered, expecting Azerbaijan to reject it. Meanwhile,
the political scientist thinks by rejecting Azerbaijan has taken a
track which favors it, when the co-chairs reduce the amount of
compromise by Azerbaijan and increase the amount of compromise by
Armenia.
Hmayak Hovanisyan says there is no international guarantee of security
of Karabakh unless the Armenian force controls the liberated
territories. The political scientist says history shows the relativity
of international guarantees, and if we cede territories, it will be too
difficult to guarantee the security of Karabakh and Armenia in terms of
increasing the physical and material resource of Karabakh and Armenia.
Hmayak Hovanisyan says a war, launched by Azerbaijan, not by us,
ensured the natural border of division of nations essential to security
and peace, and the one who violates it should think that thereby they
shatter the basis of peace and stability.
At the same time, both Kiro Manoyan and Hmayak Hovanisyan are convinced
that in 14 years Armenia has not used the status quo effectively, has
failed to populate the liberated territories. For instance, if we had a
population of half a million in Karabakh, Kiro Manoyan says, the
position of Armenia in the talks would be quite different.
By the way, Kiro Manoyan said in the current situation the voice of
Artsakh should be heard. In this connection, he noticed an essential
controversy between the responses of the foreign minister and the
minister of defense of Karabakh but noted that as the foreign minister
of Karabakh stated, if Azerbaijan wants to settle the conflict, it must
negotiate with Karabakh.