FORMALITIES BEFORE RATIFICATIONS
Armine Avetyan

February 23, 2010

Yesterday for the first time the Armenian-Turkish protocols
were formally discussed in the National Assembly. Indeed, during
yesterday’s session of the Foreign Relations Committee of the NA they
have discussed not the contents of the protocols but the procedures
of the discussion of the protocols.

Urgent issue

Before the launch of the discussion of the procedures of the
discussion, during the session the head of the NA secretariat
Tatoul Soghomonyan entered to the room. At that time the head of the
committee Armen Rustamyan said that the government has submitted to
urgent discussion of the NA the draft amendments to Armenia’s Law ‘On
International Treaties’ and that this draft should be discussed in the
urgent session of the NA as well. They went to break immediately after
that. The deputy-minister of foreign affairs Shavarsh Kocharyan arrived
to present the draft. This draft also related to the protocols. Let
us remember that approximately two months ago the president of
Armenia Serzh Sargsyan announced that he has assigned the relevant
bodies of Armenia to prepare amendments to the law on international
treaties. "This is evidence that the assignment of the president
is being abided," said Kocharyan. "If these were not the well-known
protocols perhaps so much attention would not be drawn to this law
and the omissions that exist there," added Rustamyan.

According to this initiative the RA President, Prime Minister and the
Foreign Affairs Minister will acquire the power to call back or annul
international treaties by only informing the second party of that. "I
want to clarify to avoid creating the impression that the meaning of
the changes is that there is a decision that we should quickly quit
the process," Kocharyan explained. "The Armenian side sincerely seeks
to implement the protocols. On the other hand, we will never tolerate
this whole process being used for advancing preconditions," he warned.

The head of the foreign relations committee, meanwhile, has formally
requested the speaker not to bring up the protocols for discussion
until the parliament receives his committee’s conclusions. Armen
Rustamyan, a senior lawmaker from the Armenian Revolutionary
Federation (Dashnaktsutyun), one of the key critics of the protocols,
said Hovik Abrahamyan has not yet provided a clear response to the
request. During preliminary discussions of the protocols on Friday
the key parliamentary committee dominated by pro-government lawmakers
decided to set up a five-member group to work out, within a week,
a procedure in which the protocols will be discussed by the body.

Rustamyan complained of the circumstance that only the President and
the Executive branch bodies can have the power to annul the treaties.

He suggested that the An should also have the power to do so. "The
Parliament has a better power to ratify or not ratify," opposed
Kocharyan. This draft has deserved quite tense discussions in
the session of the committee. Is this an alarm to deflect from
the process of normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations? If the
law on international treaties has so many omissions why have they
decided to amend the part that relates to cancellation and annulment
of treaties and agreements? These questions were asked by the head
of the Heritage faction Stepan Safaryan. The MP also added that
this draft creates an opportunity to cancel the protocols they are
against that. In his words, besides this flaw there are many others
in the law. "This law has a purpose so that we’d allow our country
to have tools by which to protect our state interests. And we should
maximally enlarge the arsenal of these tools. But are we doing the
necessary changes coming from the current situation. I think that this
is not complete and for that we have our package of recommendations,"
Rustamyan said. Armen Rustamyan also said that "as things stand now"
the foreign relations committee dominated by pro-government lawmakers,
including representatives of the Republican Party, is likely to provide
a positive conclusion on the protocols. Rustamyan, though, contended
that his arguments as well as those of another opposition party’s
committee member "cannot fail to have some impact on the discussion."

"This is a matter of crucial importance, and therefore the sessions
could last for several days," said Rustamyan, adding that after
the completion of preliminary discussions a separate meeting will
be appointed for the committee to reach its conclusion. "This law
should allow us deflecting from the protocols any time we feel the
need," concluded Rustamyan. As a result, the committee indeed gave
a positive evaluation to the initiative pf the government to include
this issue in the agenda of the NA session. And the former chairman of
the NA Tigran Torosyan assumes that this draft is a tool to pressure
on the Turkish side to ratify the process. "But I am more than sure
that this pressure is not going to affect Turkey at all. Moreover,
I think that there was even no need to submit such a draft because if
the protocols are not ratified the parties can any time cancel those
and deflect from the process. By this everything will be over. In these
cases it is better to have a clear vision and position rather than
take unclear strides. They could have brought the protocols to the
National Assembly and let the MPs vote based on their conscience and
convictions. The RA government thinks that if an agreement is signed
it should be ratified by all means. Indeed it is not so. There are
many countries that don’t ratify the agreements after signing those,"
says Torosyan.

The protocols will not be signed yet

Last Friday Serzh Sargsyan sent the protocols to the NA. And these were
mechanically included not only in the big session of the NA but also
in the 4-day session to be launched on Monday. According to the law
on international treaties this type of treaties are immediately in
the agendas of discussions. So the positive or negative evaluation
of the foreign relations committee cannot have any influence on
the process of discussion of the protocols. So according to the NA
bylaw only the chairman of the National Assembly determines the
terms and sequence of discussion of issues. But yesterday Armen
Rustamyan suggested the NA chairman not to discuss the protocols
until those are discussed within the NA foreign relations committee
and Hovik Abrahamyan accepted this suggestion. And prior to that,
Safaryan suggested that first parliamentary hearings are held on these
documents and only after that submit those to the conclusion of the
committee. Rustamyan wasn’t against this but left this issue to the
decision of the political parties of the parliament. In his words on
Monday the 5 NA parliamentary factions will present their attitudes
to the head of the commission. Besides that it was decided to create
a special working group consisting of a representative from each of
the 5 factions. The working group will discuss the procedures of the
discussion of the protocols in the NA. So the 5 members are Armen
Rustamyan, Stepan Safaryan, Ernest Soghomonyan from the Prosperous
Armenia, Hamlet Harutyunyan from the RPA and Seryozha Abrahamyan
from the Legal State. There is an opinion that the protocols should
be discussed in all the 12 committees of the NA so that the latter
would bring up their recommendations.