THE WAVE VANISHES AND NOTHING REMAINS
Lilit Poghosyan

Hayots Ashkhar Daily
14 Nov 08
Armenia

During the recent days the radicals diligently develop the version
of the inter-party crisis "ripening" inside RPA.

On this occasion RPA Vice-Chairman, MP Razmik Zohrabyan responds
our questions.

"They say the Republican Party again "splits", this time because
of sharp controversies linked with the appointment of the head of
the faction."

"Nothing special happened. But because you asked I must say that this
is not the issue to cause "serious discontent" inside the party. This
chitchat started when the head of the faction Karen Karapetyan was
appointed as the head of the Presidential staff and Hovik Abrahamyan
was elected as Speaker of NA. The appointment of the head of the
faction took a bit long, because here the standpoint of the Leader
of the Party is really important and at that time the President was
engaged in foreign policy issues, the preparation of the declaration
on the settlement of Karabakh issue, etc.

I must repeat that there is no discontent inside the party, but the
Republican Party is a living organism, living with its party-political
problems and naturally there can be different approaches, in the
issue of the appointment of the head of the faction as well.

What we need is a qualified person, someone who has experience in
working with people, a good organizer, to be able to work with 64 MPs
of the faction. In this regard Galust Sahakyan has great experience
in working with people, he used to be the head of the faction which
he implemented very successfully, and when the Leader of the Party
proposed his candidacy during the session of the council, we perceived
it quite normally.

As regards Edward Sharmazanov, whose name was also circulated, he is
an active, skillful, young political figure who could also work in
that position. In my view whole life is before him. So I don’t see any
problem among the old and new republicans, pro-Njdehs and "komsomols".

"Robert Kocharyan’s possible "return" is a matter of anxiety for some
people. Do you think the second President really intends to "take"
the majority of NA and form his own government as the representatives
of the Armenian Pan National Movement state in terror."

"Some months back Robert Kocharyan "handed over" the power and frankly
I don’t think he hurries to hold the position of the Prime Minister
or the Speaker of NA or any other post. Power is not that sweet. It
demands lots of suffering."

And besides that for such action there should be a demand. For example
if something jeopardizes the national security and the incumbent
President can’t solve that issue and there is20a requirement for a
second leader.

At the moment I don’t see such demand. Serge Sargsyan is quite able
to solve issues."

"Can Moscow declaration become a trap for the Armenian party. Don’t
you think Azerbaijan can breach the agreement and attack Karabakh?"

"I don’t think the declaration will blunt our vigilance. There
have been certain cases in the history, when the two parties signed
agreement on not using force, but one of the parties has breached
the agreement. But we shouldn’t overlook the fact that Russia, which
is a powerful superpower, is one of the parties to the declaration,
which has got its own interests in the region and will never allow
new start of Armenian -Azerbaijani conflict, even if the third party
tries to provoke the war."

"How do you estimate the situation created in the pro-oppositional
camp.

When will they start their active actions?"

"I have already underscored that when a political force is leaded
from outside they can’t take decision on when to become active. At
the moment they are disoriented. If tomorrow they are instructed from
outside that they must continue their demonstrations, they will do so,
speculating Karabakh issue.

If they are really guided by national interests and they consider
Madrid principles unacceptable for the Armenian party, they shouldn’t
quit demonstrations, on the con trary they should have tried to
put pressure on the international community and our authorities to
avert the signing of any agreement which enshrines these principles,
instead of stepping aside "to give possibility to the ruling power
to solve Karabakh issue without any obstacles."