MOTHERLAND WILL WAIT. BUT THE GOVERNMENT’S PATIENCE HAS LIMITS
Naira Mamikonyan

Aravot
Jan 24 2009
Armenia

The Armenian government made a decision at the end of 2008 to dissolve
the special combat operations department of the National Security
Service [NSS], abbreviated as the NSS’s "special forces". This
subunit was set up in the above entity in January 1994 on the
instruction of fist Armenian President Levon Ter-Petrosyan. The
purpose was to protect Armenia’s territory from foreign aggression
during the years of the Karabakh war; and the task of the subunit
was to organize various subversive operations up to 50 km inside
[Azerbaijani territory]. Incidentally, such entities exist within
the national security body of any country. That entity also had the
goal to ensure security in our country – for instance, the security
of the Armenian nuclear power plant and so on. At present, while the
Artsakh [Karabakh] war is not fully over and in general there is a
threat of foreign aggression, the people who served in this entity
(staffed with quite competent personnel, according to some experts)
and pundits believe that the dissolution of this subunit is a betrayal
of the state and nation. A former deputy head of Armenia’s State
National Security Department, Gurgen Yeghiazaryan, is one of those
who describe this decision of the Armenian government in this way.

According to an Aravot source, part of the servicemen and officers
of the dissolved subunit have been moved to border troops under the
NSS or to Armenia’s police troops. However, a significant part of the
officers refused to move to Armenia’s police troops or the "special
forces" to be established under the police.

The matter is that the national government has decided to set up
"special forces" of police. The police has this kind of forces only as
part of its general department for fighting organized crime. According
to information that we received, the future "special forces" will
comprise 1,000-1,500 servicemen, but not conscripts, like it was in
the case of the NSS, but exclusively contract-based servicemen. This
subunit will, naturally, serve to restrain, disperse, beat or kill
those participating in domestic political riots.

The matter is that the already former "employees of the special forces"
were less aggressive than police troops, "the special forces of the
6th [police department for fighting organized crime]", and bodyguards
of oligarchs during the 1 March 2008 post-election events and during
the "cleansing" of Freedom Square [the venue of opposition sit-in
protests in Yerevan], and thus they are no longer reliable. As we face
a financial crisis in the future and aggravation of social conditions,
social riots and activation of the opposition’s wide-scale protests
is possible. "Naturally, the concern of this government will not be
protection of the motherland. They now have the task of protecting
their power. Involving the NSS ‘special forces’ into domestic
political processes yet another time can cause a wider reaction,"
Yeghiazaryan said.