EurAsia Review
May 1 2010

Armenia Ex-President’s Wild Games

Saturday, May 01, 2010
By Simon Maghakyan

Newly-revealed summer 2009 photos of ex-Soviet Armenia’s former
president Robert Kocharian posing with hunted `wild game,’ including a
lion, in Tanzania have Armenian bloggers talking. Yet few seem
surprised ` a national reserve employee’s illegal boar hunting and an
oligarchic donkey-lion fight were caught on tape the same year. One
blogger, nonetheless, reads political overtones in the ex-president’s
luxurious safari adventures.

The Armenian Observer Blog, Artur Papyan’s resourceful site, posts one
of the controversial photographs with the following note:

Armenia’s second President Robert Kocharian is a big fan of safaris.
Here he is proudly posing on a killed lion. Years of observing
Kocharian have taught me one thing ` he never does anything without a
purpose. The fact he has posed on a lion means he wanted to let
everyone know he is the lion killing kind.

Coincidentally, the animal’s name is synonymous to the name of
Kocharian’s bitter political rival, Armenia’s first President Levon
Ter-Petrossian. In a recent display of distaste for each other,
Kocharian told an allegoric story about his African safaris, directing
pro-Ter-Petrossian media to finding and publicising this very photo,
which made a headline story on `Haykakan Zhamanak’ today.
[¦]
Ahuramazd, a pro-opposition Live Journal community member, posts four
photographs without comment. But he prompts quite a discussion.

Fellow user Dabavog reacts in Armenian:

The lack of harmony between Armenians (especially the government) and
nature requires a special study. (translated)

Pigh, a pro-government activist, defends the former president in Russian:

[Ara]mazd, what’s the crime? You don’t eat meat? (translated)

Simon Maghakyan is a native of Armenia and a graduate student in
political science at University of Colorado Denver. He is also an
alumnus of the International Institute for Genocide and Human Rights
Studies. Connect to Simon’s blog at

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