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    Categories: 2021

RFE/RL Armenian Report – 12/21/2021

                                        Tuesday, 


Another French Presidential Candidate Visits Armenia


Armenia - Armenian President Armen Sarkissian meets with Valerie Pecresse, a 
Fench presidential candidate and head of Ile de France region, .


Valerie Pecresse, a French conservative politician emerging as President 
Emmanuel Macron’s main challenger in next year’s presidential elections, pledged 
continued support for Armenia when she visited the country on Tuesday.

Pecresse met with President Armen Sarkissian, Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan, 
parliament speaker Alen Simonian and Catholicos Garegin II, the supreme head of 
the Armenian Apostolic Church.

Official Armenian press releases on the separate meetings indicated that she was 
received in her capacity as head of the Ile de France region of greater Paris.

The region is home to a large part of France’s influential Armenian community 
numbering some 600,000 people. French presidential candidates will vie for their 
votes during the tight presidential race.

A new poll released over the weekend showed Pecresse as the likely challenger to 
Macron in the second round of the elections slated for April 2022. They were 
trailed by two far-right candidates, Eric Zemmour and Marine Le Pen.

Zemmour chose Armenia for his first campaign trip which he took a week ago. The 
former journalist known for his controversial statements against Islam and 
immigration urged strong Western support for what he described as a Christian 
nation situated “in the middle of an Islamic ocean.”

Unlike Pecresse, Zemmour was not received by high-ranking Armenian officials. He 
met with several senior parliamentarians representing Armenia’s ruling party.


Armenia -- French far-right party "Reconquete!" leader, media pundit and 
candidate for the 2022 French presidential election Eric Zemmour in downtown 
Yerevan on December 12, 2021.

During her trip Pecresse was accompanied by former French Foreign Minister 
Michel Barnier and Bruno Retailleau, who leads the conservative Les Republicains 
party’s group in the French Senate. Pecresse won early this month the opposition 
party’s primary to be its presidential candidate.

Sarkissian described her as a “good friend of Armenia and the Armenian people.” 
The Pecresse campaign’s Twitter page said they spoke for two hours to “evoke the 
strong ties between Armenia and France.”

The president and the other Armenian leaders also discussed with Pecresse the 
aftermath of last year’s war in Nagorno-Karabakh.

While in Yerevan Pecresse laid flowers at the Armenian genocide memorial and the 
Yerablur military cemetery where hundreds of Armenian soldiers killed during the 
six-week war were buried.

“What happened to Armenia last year is a warning that we would be wrong to 
assume that this does not concern us,” Julien Neny, a French journalist covering 
the trip, quoted her as saying afterwards.

Pecresse also told reporters that if elected president she will organize “an 
international conference in Paris in support of Armenia.”


FRANCE -- French President Emmanuel Macron, left, welcomes Armenian acting Prime 
Minister Nikol Pashinian before a working lunch at the Elysee Palace in Paris, 
June 1, 2021

Her visit coincided with Macron’s 44th birthday anniversary. In a congratulatory 
message sent on Tuesday, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian wished the French 
president “unwavering will, strength and unshakable faith to lead the French 
people to new victorious horizons.”

“I assure you that in that high mission, Armenia stands with your and friendly 
France, ready to defend the common values, universal rights and civilizational 
heritage that unite us,” Pashinian wrote.

Macron and Pashinian most recently met in Brussels on December 15 during 
trilateral talks with Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.

“We will never abandon the Armenians,” Macron tweeted after the meeting. “We 
will always seek solutions for a lasting peace.”



Pashinian’s Choice Of Negotiator With Turkey Criticized

        • Gayane Saribekian
        • Nane Sahakian

Armenia - Deputy speaker Ruben Rubinian chairs a session of the National 
Assembly, Yerevan, October 5, 2021


Armenian analysts and opposition politicians have criticized Prime Minister 
Nikol Pashinian for appointing a 31-year-old political ally lacking diplomatic 
experience to represent Armenia in upcoming negotiations with Turkey.
The Armenian and Turkish governments said last week that they will try to 
normalize relations between the two neighboring states and will name special 
envoys for that purpose.

Ankara went on to choose Serdar Kilic, a career diplomat who served as Turkey’s 
ambassador to the United States from 2014-2021, for that role. For its part, the 
Armenian side named Ruben Rubinian, a deputy speaker of the parliament and 
senior member of Pashinian’s Civil Contract party.

Rubinian was appointed as a deputy foreign minister following the 2018 “velvet 
revolution” that brought Pashinian to power. He resigned from that post eight 
months later after being elected to Armenia’s former parliament.

Rubinian headed the parliament committee on foreign relations until snap general 
elections held in June this year. In August, he became one of the current 
National Assembly’s three vice-speakers.

Pashinian has not yet explained his decision to handpick a young loyalist, 
rather than a professional diplomat, to lead the planned talks with the Turks. 
The move has been construed by some as a sign of his distrust in the Armenian 
Foreign Ministry.

Pashinian has replaced two foreign ministers, both of them career diplomats, 
over the past year. One of them, Ara Ayvazian, signaled serious policy 
disagreements with the prime minister when he resigned in May. All of Ayvazian’s 
four deputies also tendered their resignations.


Armenia - Outgoing Foreign Minister Ara Ayvazian addresses Armenian Foreign 
Ministry staff during a fairwell meeting in Yerevan, May 31, 2021.

Lawmakers representing the main opposition Hayastan alliance on Monday expressed 
concern over Pashinian’s choice of the special envoy. They questioned Rubinian’s 
competence and ability to properly negotiate with his far more experienced 
Turkish opposite number.

Some Armenian pundits shared the opposition concerns on Tuesday.

“I don’t think that Rubinian is the most brilliant candidate [for the role,]” 
said Armen Baghdasarian, a veteran political commentator. “Moreover, I believe 
he can botch any initiative.”

“He is not a diplomat,” warned Ruben Safrastian, a leading expert on Turkey at 
the Armenian National Academy of Sciences. “It will be difficult for him to 
negotiate with an experienced diplomat like Serdar Kilic.”

Armen Khachatrian, a senior lawmaker from the ruling party, dismissed these 
concerns.

“You don’t become a parliament speaker, chairman of the parliament committee on 
foreign relations and a deputy foreign minister at such a young age for no 
reason,” Khachatrian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “This means the guy has 
that capacity and potential.”

Rubinian refused on Monday to answer questions about his new mission.

Meanwhile, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu announced that the Armenian 
and Turkish negotiators will hold their first meeting soon. But he gave no 
concrete dates.


U.S. -- Turkish Ambassador to the United States Serdar Kilic speaks to the 
Conference on U.S.-Turkey Relations in Washington, May 22, 2017
Cavusoglu also reiterated that Turkey will continue to coordinate its policy 
towards Armenia with Azerbaijan.

Ankara has for decades refused to establish diplomatic relations with Yerevan 
and kept the Turkish-Armenian border closed out of solidarity with Azerbaijan. 
It provided decisive military support to Baku during last year’s 
Armenian-Azerbaijani war over Nagorno-Karabakh.

In recent months Turkish leaders have made statements making the normalization 
of Turkish-Armenian relations conditional on Armenia agreeing to open a land 
corridor that would connect Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave. They have 
also cited Baku’s demands for a formal Armenian recognition of Azerbaijani 
sovereignty over Karabakh.

Armenian opposition figures and other government critics say that Ankara is 
continuing to set unacceptable preconditions for Yerevan. They claim that 
Pashinian may be ready to accept them.

Baghdasarian echoed those claims. “I also don’t think that Pashinian can clearly 
define the current agenda of Turkish-Armenian relations because he seems ready 
to cede practically everything,” he said.



IMF Expects Slower Growth In Armenia

        • Emil Danielyan

U.S. -- An exterior view of the building of the International Monetary Fund 
(IMF) is seen in Washington, March 27, 2020


Armenia’s economy will likely grow in the coming years more slowly than the 
Armenian government has predicted, according to the International Monetary Fund.

“Going forward, the economic outlook is generally positive with medium-term 
growth projected around 4.5-5 percent, contingent upon the COVID-19 
developments, external demand, and progress on structural reforms 
implementation,” the IMF said in a statement issued late last week.

The government’s five-year policy program approved by the Armenian parliament in 
August says that the country’s GDP should increase by 7 percent annually.

The Armenian economy contracted by 7.4 percent last year due to adverse effects 
of the coronavirus pandemic compounded by the war in Nagorno-Karabakh. It 
returned to growth this spring.

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian said in July that GDP growth will reach 6 percent 
this year. The IMF and the World Bank forecast more modest growth rates 
afterwards.

“An economic rebound is now underway, with projected growth of around 5.5 
percent in 2021,” read the latest IMF statement.

The governor of Armenia’s Central Bank, Martin Galstian, predicted on December 
14 an even lower growth rate for this year: 4.2 percent. Presenting the bank’s 
latest projections, he said growth should accelerate to 5.3 percent in 2022.

Armenia’s 2022 state budget approved by the parliament earlier this month is 
based on a 7 percent growth target set by Pashinian’s government. It calls for 
significant increases in public spending and tax revenue. Opposition politicians 
and some economists say the government targets are not realistic.


Armenia - Workers at a new textile factory in Gyumri, December 7, 2018.
As well as predicting slower growth, the IMF praised the government’s five-year 
program and, in particular, reforms envisaged by it. It also said the Armenian 
authorities “appropriately responded” to the 2020 recession.

“The Fund’s financial support will help Armenia meet its challenges -- including 
the social and economic implications of COVID-19 pandemic -- while moving ahead 
with its reform agenda,” added the statement.

The IMF made its latest growth projections as it announced the disbursement of a 
fresh $72 million installment of a $432 million Stand-By Arrangement, a loan 
designed to help Armenia cope with economic consequences of the pandemic.

The loan tranche brought to about $396 million the total amount of funds 
allocated to the country under the three-year lending program launched in May 
2019.



Azeri Soldiers Captured, Freed By Armenia

        • Astghik Bedevian

Armenia - Armenian soldiers take up positions on the border with Azerbaijan, 
December 20, 2020.


The Armenian military released and repatriated two Azerbaijani soldiers late on 
Monday two days after capturing them on Armenia’s border with Azerbaijan.

The Defense Ministry in Yerevan said they were detained at an Armenian border 
post on Saturday. It gave no details.

A short amateur video circulated online earlier on Monday showed Armenian 
military personnel handcuffing the Azerbaijani soldiers and putting them in a 
military truck parked at what looked like an army outpost.

A ministry statement said they were sent back to Azerbaijan “for humanitarian 
considerations and with Russian mediation.”

Russian peacekeeping forces stationed in Nagorno-Karabakh confirmed the handover 
on their Telegram page on Tuesday. They also posted pictures of Armenian, 
Azerbaijani and Russian officers sitting at a table and signing a document in 
the presence of the freed soldiers.

The latter were reportedly captured at a border section close to the scene of 
the November 16 fighting between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces that left at 
least 13 troops from both sides dead. Three dozen Armenian soldiers were taken 
prisoner that day in what Yerevan condemned as an Azerbaijani attack on Armenian 
territory.

Twenty-one of those soldiers have been set free since then. The eleven others 
remain detained in Azerbaijan.

Opposition leaders strongly criticized the Armenian authorities for not swapping 
the two Azerbaijanis with these or other Armenian prisoners of war held by Baku. 
The authorities declined to clearly explain their decision to swiftly free the 
Azerbaijani soldiers.

“Why were the two [Azerbaijani] POWs sent back? Let our security bodies not 
divulge any details to you,” Andranik Kocharian, the pro-government chairman of 
the Armenian parliament committee on defense and security, told journalists.

“If the [Azerbaijani] POWs were handed over to the enemy, it means that there is 
something there stemming from our interests,” Kocharian said vaguely.

Aram Vartevanian, a lawmaker from the main opposition Hayastan bloc, argued that 
Baku is continuing to hold dozens of Armenian POWs in breach of Russian-mediated 
agreements reached during and after last year’s war over Nagorno-Karabakh.

“When our adversary behaves this way, how can the Armenian authorities’ behavior 
be explained?” he said. “I would call it … yet another toothless action by these 
authorities.”


Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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