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    Categories: 2020

RFE/RL Armenian Report – 05/11/2020

                                        Monday, 

Armenian Ombudsman Alarmed By Online Hate Speech

        • Naira Bulghadarian

Armenia -- Human Rights Defender Arman Tatoyan speaks to RFE/RL, March 13, 2019

Armenia’s human rights ombudsman, Arman Tatoyan, expressed serious concern on 
Monday about growing hate speech on social media, saying that it has reached 
alarming proportions in the country.

“All over the world intolerance on social media is considered a serious 
challenge to freedom of speech,” said Tatoyan. “One of the worrying problems of 
2019 was the spread of insults, hatred and degrading speech.”

“This vicious phenomenon has reached inadmissible proportions on social media. 
Particularly serious is aggression that is spread by fake users and groups,” he 
added in in an annual report on his office’s activities and human rights 
practices in Armenia presented to the parliament.

Tatoyan urged Armenians to avoid online debates featuring insults, threats or 
hateful statements.

Such content posted by local users on Facebook, other social media platforms as 
well as comments sections of online media outlets has become widespread in 
recent years. Supporters and opponents of the Armenian government routinely use 
abusive language to attack and even threaten each other or politicians from the 
opposite camp.

Pro-government and opposition politicians regularly accuse each other of running 
troll factories to bully and discredit political rivals. They both deny doing 
that.

In January this year, a member of Yerevan’s municipal council representing the 
ruling My Step bloc caused outrage after urging fellow government supporters to 
attack Constitutional Court Chairman Hrayr Tovmasian’s daughter on Facebook. My 
Step forced him to resign.

In March, Armenian parliament passed legislation criminalizing public calls for 
violence or attempts to justify it.




Former PM Karapetian Rules Out Political Comeback


Armenia - Acting Prime Minister Karen Karapetian chairs his last cabinet meeting 
in Yerevan, 3 May 2018.

Former Prime Minister Karen Karapetian said he disagrees with many policies of 
the current Armenian government but has no plans to return to active politics 
when he made a rare public appearance on Monday.

“I don’t want to engage in politics,” Karapetian said after testifying before an 
Armenian parliamentary commission investigating the April 2016 hostilities in 
Nagorno-Karabakh. He refused to give any details of his testimony, arguing that 
it included state secrets.

Karapetian said on Monday that he monitors political developments in Armenia “to 
a certain degree and not in a systematic fashion.”

When asked to assess the current government’s track record, he said: “Today I 
wish the government success so that we come out of this situation with minimal 
losses because the [coronavirus] problem is really serious. But I don’t agree 
with the government on many issues.”

He did not elaborate.

Karapetian was appointed as prime minister in September 2016 by then President 
Serzh Sarkisian. He ceded that post to Sarkisian and was named first deputy 
prime minister in April 2018 after Sarkisian engineered Armenia’s transition to 
a parliamentary system of government.

Karapetian became the country’s acting prime minister just one week later, after 
Sarkisian resigned amid nationwide street protests against his continued rule. 
But he too had to step down after the Armenian parliament reluctantly elected 
the protest leader, Nikol Pashinian, prime minister on May 8, 2018.

Karapetian has kept a very low profile and made no political statements since 
then. He resigned as first deputy chairman of Sarkisian’s Republican Party of 
Armenia (HHK) in June 2018 and left the HHK altogether December 2018.

Sarkisian’s dramatic resignation came one day after the arrest of Pashinian and 
his associates which only intensified the anti-government protests. Karapetian 
personally negotiated with Pashinian hours before the latter was set free on 
April 23, 2018.

The 56-year-old technocrat refused to shed light on their conversation. 
“Whatever we agreed on with Mr Pashinian was our internal agreement,” he said, 
adding that neither side has breached it.


Armenia -- Former Prime Minister Karen Karapetian attends the trial of former 
President Robert Kocharian, Yerevan, May 8, 2020.

Last week Karapetian and two other former Armenian prime ministers appeared 
before a Yerevan court to call for the release former President Robert Kocharian 
from custody pending the outcome of his ongoing trial.

Commenting on that move, Karapetian said: “I respect and appreciate Robert 
Kocharian’s contribution to the independence and development of Artsakh 
(Nagorno-Karabakh) and Armenia. This judicial process has been going on for 
almost two years and it may well last much longer. That is why I submitted a 
petition for his release.”

“I think that this process is quite agitated and politicized,” he said when 
asked whether he thinks the coup and corruption charges leveled against 
Kocharian are politically motivated.

Kocharian strongly denies the charges, having accused Pashinian of waging a 
“political vendetta.” Pashinian and prosecutors deny any political motives 
behind the high-profile case.

Last December, then Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev appointed Karapetian 
as a senior member of a body advising the Russian government on key economic and 
social policies. It emerged at the time that Karapetian now also works as an 
adviser to the chairman of Russia’s Gazprombank.

Karapetian already held senior positions in Gazprombank and other subsidiaries 
of Russia’s Gazprom energy giant when he lived and worked in Russia from 
2011-2016. He managed Armenia’s Gazprom-owned natural gas distribution network 
from 2001-2010.




Pashinian Accused Of Inciting Violence Against Opposition Lawmakers

        • Astghik Bedevian
        • Gayane Saribekian

Armenia -- Deputies from the opposition Bright Armenia Party attend a parliament 
session in Yerevan, January 20, 2020.

A major opposition party has accused Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian of condoning 
and inciting violent attacks on its members following an ugly brawl that 
disrupted a session of Armenia’s parliament on Friday.

The brawl broke out in Pashinian’s presence during a speech delivered by Edmon 
Marukian, the leader of the Bright Armenia Party (LHK), on the parliament floor. 
Marukian lambasted pro-government parliamentarians and was punched by one of 
them before dozens of other lawmakers representing the LHK and Pashinian’s My 
Step bloc joined in the resulting melee.

Addressing the National Assembly later on Friday, Pashinian deplored the 
violence but effectively blamed it on Marukian’s party. He said that his 
political allies should not have succumbed to what he described as a LHK 
“provocation” aimed at discrediting the Armenian government.

The prime minister went on brand Marukian’s party as “parliamentary servants” of 
former Presidents Serzh Sarkisian and Robert Kocharian.

In a statement issued on Monday, the LHK condemned Pashinian’s speech, saying 
that he thereby “justified, legitimized and encouraged” violence against his 
political opponents.

“The incident showed that it took the revolutionary prime minister only two 
years to completely dismantle and demolish the ideas, values and principles 
declared by that revolution,” it said, referring to the 2018 protest movement 
that toppled Sarkisian and brought Pashinian to power.


Armenia -- Pro-government and opposition deputies brawl on the parliament floor, 
Yerevan, May 8, 2020.

The LHK, which is one of the two opposition parties represented in the current 
National Assembly, also strongly denied having ties to Armenia’s former rulers. 
“The prime minister is deliberately labeling Bright Armenia as representatives 
of the ‘former regime’ in order to justify the hooligan behavior of his deputies 
in the eyes of his supporters,” it charged.

“What is more, My Step members portray all of their opponents and critics as 
enemies of the state and the people and anti-state elements who can be 
legitimately assaulted,” added the LHK statement. It claimed that this 
“totalitarian mindset” could eventually lead to authoritarian rule in Armenia.

In a weekend video address livestreamed on Facebook, Marukian similarly accused 
Pashinian of “encouraging” his loyalists to assault opposition figures. “This 
speech [by Pashinian] demonstrated that their clock is ticking,” he added.

The brawl occurred one day after Pashinian and Marukian held an unexpected 
one-on-one meeting in the parliament building. The opposition leader claimed 
afterwards that they only discussed recent developments in the Nagorno-Karabakh 
conflict.

Pashinian said in his parliament speech, however, that they also spoke about 
domestic political issues. He said he told Marukian that he has “grounds to 
suspect that you and your activities are an integral part of a plan to use 
psychological, moral and, ultimately, physical violence” against Armenia’s 
political leadership and its allies.


Armenia -- Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian (L) talks to a parliament deputy from 
his My Step bloc, Yerevan, May 6, 2020.

In his Facebook transmission, Marukian admitted that Pashinian alleged possible 
ties between the LHK and the former regime during their conversation. He 
suggested that the premier might have been angered by his remark that Armenia’s 
next government will be formed by the LHK.

Hrachya Hakobian, a My Step lawmaker, accused the LHK leader of lying about the 
agenda of Thursday’s meeting with Pashinian. Hakobian, who is also Pashinian’s 
brother-in-law, defended the prime minister’s and the parliament majority’s 
stance on Friday’s incident.

Levon Barseghian, a veteran civic activist who actively participated in the 2018 
“Velvet Revolution,” said, meanwhile, no “provocation” can justify the violent 
response to Marukian. He said that Sasun Mikaelian, the My Step deputy who was 
the first throw a punch, must be “held accountable.”

Barseghian also argued: “The same opposition people formed, together with Nikol 
Pashinian, the opposition in the [former] parliament and they also harshly 
criticized the [former ruling] Republican Party.”

Pashinian and Marukian used to co-head the Yelk bloc that challenged Armenia’s 
former leadership. The bloc fell apart after Marukian and his party refused to 
join mass protests launched by Pashinian in April 2018 against Sarkisian’s 
attempt to extend his decade-long rule.


Armenia -- Parliament deputy Sasun Mikayelian speaks to journalists, Yerevan, 
October 27, 2019.
Meanwhile, Mikaelian remained unrepentant and blamed Marukian for the brawl on 
Monday. He also dismissed calls for his resignation from the parliament. He said 
he will quit only if Marukian does the same.

“It was [Marukian’s] fault,” declared the 62-year-old veteran of the 
Nagorno-Karabakh war. “If he’s man enough to hand his mandate I’ll hand mine 
too.”

A senior member of Marukian’s LHK, Gevorg Gorgisian, dismissed the offer as 
“nonsense.” “It’s like catching a robber and the victim of a robbery and 
prosecuting them on the same charge,” he said.

Mikaelian also set another condition. He demanded an apology from Marukian’s 
younger brother Edgar who insulted him in a Facebook post which was subsequently 
deleted by the latter.

“Young man, your mother is sacred for me, but if you don’t apologize for what 
you said … you all know who I am, my actions, my words, and nothing good will 
await you,” Mikaelian warned in the parliament.

Gorgisian condemned the warning as a threat of fresh violence. He said that 
unlike Edgar Marukian, Mikaelian is a state official and must behave 
accordingly. “The National Assembly is not the place for a language of threats,” 
Gorgisian told RFE/RL’s Armenian service.


Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2020 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

 


Emil Lazarian: “I should like to see any power of the world destroy this race, this small tribe of unimportant people, whose wars have all been fought and lost, whose structures have crumbled, literature is unread, music is unheard, and prayers are no more answered. Go ahead, destroy Armenia . See if you can do it. Send them into the desert without bread or water. Burn their homes and churches. Then see if they will not laugh, sing and pray again. For when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia.” - WS