Monday,
Armenian Opposition Gears Up For ‘Big Rally’
• Gayane Saribekian
• Robert Zargarian
Armenia - Opposition members and supporters led by deputy parliament speaker
Ishkhan Saghatelian (center) march through Yerevan, .
Armenia’s leading opposition alliances began on Monday coordinated small-scale
demonstrations in Yerevan in preparation for mass protests aimed at toppling
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian.
Senior members of the Hayastan alliance again pledged to thwart what they say
are sweeping concessions to Azerbaijan planned by Pashinian as they led several
hundred supporters on an “awareness march” through the city’s northern Arabkir
district.
Earlier in the day, a group of Hayastan activists blocked Arabkir’s main
thoroughfare, Komitas Avenue, before being detained by riot police.
Several others headed to Yerevan on foot from Pashinian’s hometown, Ijevan. The
opposition bloc headed by former President Robert Kocharian promised similar
marches to the Armenian capital from three other parts of the country.
“Every day we will be organizing various protests, marches and demonstrations in
Yerevan,” Hayastan’s Ishkhan Saghatelian told reporters.
“Our goal is to get our people all over Armenia to rise up over the next five
days,” he said, adding that the opposition has scheduled its first “big rally”
for Sunday.
“We have come out for a decisive fight,” said Anna Grigorian, another lawmaker
representing the bloc. She charged that Pashinian and his political team are
“ready to see Karabakh as a part of Azerbaijan.”
Meanwhile, Artur Vanetsian, a leader of the Pativ Unem alliance, led a similar
march through the city center. Vanetsian and a group of his loyalists had begun
a nonstop sit-in in Liberty Square on April 17.
Armenia - Opposition leader Artur Vanetsian (right) and his supporters protest
in Yerevan, .
Vanetsian said on Monday morning that he has succeeded in attracting public
attention and that the opposition can now switch to the “second phase” of its
“decentralized” campaign.
Pativ Unem and Hayastan jointly rallied thousands of supporters in Liberty
Square on April 5 to warn Pashinian against agreeing to restore Azerbaijan’s
control over Nagorno-Karabakh. The prime minister met with Azerbaijani President
Ilham Aliyev in Brussels the following day for talks hosted by European Council
President Charles Michel.
Speaking in the parliament on April 13, Pashinian said the international
community is pressing Armenia to scale back its demands on Karabakh’s status and
recognize Azerbaijan’s territorial integrity. He signaled Yerevan’s intention to
make such concessions to Baku.
Some pro-government lawmakers insisted afterwards that Pashinian did not call
for the restoration of Azerbaijani control of Karabakh.
Karabakh Leader ‘Reassured’ By Pashinian
Armenia - Prime Minsiter Nikol Pashian meets with Karabakh President Arayik
Harutyunian, Yerevan, July 9, 2021
Nagorno-Karabakh’s leader said on Monday Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian has
assured him that Armenia will not back any agreements on the territory’s status
unacceptable to the Karabakh Armenians.
Addressing the Armenian parliament on April 13, Pashinian said that the
international community is pressing Armenia to “lower a bit the bar on the
question of Nagorno-Karabakh’s status” and recognize Azerbaijan’s territorial
integrity. He signaled Yerevan’s intention to make such concessions to Baku.
The speech welcomed by the United States and the European Union stoked Armenian
opposition allegations that Pashinian has agreed to Azerbaijani control over
Karabakh.
Karabakh’s ethnic Armenian leadership openly deplored it. In a resolution
unanimously approved by its members, the Karabakh parliament demanded that the
Armenian authorities “abandon their current disastrous position.”
Arayik Harutiunian, the Karabakh president, again commented on the issue at a
meeting with other officials in Stepanakert. Harutiunian was quoted by his press
office as telling them that “no document on the status of Artsakh (Karabakh) is
being discussed at this stage.”
He announced a “clear agreement with the prime minister of Armenia to the effect
that in case of any discussion on the future status of Artsakh at the
international level the position of the Armenian side must be agreed with the
opinion of the Republic of Artsakh’s authorities and people.”
Pashinian insisted on Friday that his administration has no plans to “surrender”
Karabakh through a peace deal with Azerbaijan. But he again did not specify
Karabakh’s status acceptable to Yerevan in the current circumstances. He
attacked his political opponents instead, saying that a tougher line advocated
by them would lead to another war with Azerbaijan and a complete loss of
Karabakh.
Armenia Plans New Nuclear Plant
• Sargis Harutyunyan
Armenia - A general view of the Metsamor nuclear plant, 12May2011.
Armenia has revived plans to build a new nuclear plant and is already
cooperating with Russia for that purpose, a senior Armenian official said on
Monday.
Deputy Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructures Hakob
Vartanian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that a joint task force formed by the
Armenian and Russian governments will explore ways of implementing the ambitious
project.
“The working group has already held the first meeting,” he said. “Right now we
are working on a feasibility study, and yes, we are going to build a new
[nuclear] energy block.”
Roughly 40 percent of Armenia’s electricity is currently generated by the
nuclear power station at Metsamor. Its sole functioning reactor went into
service in 1980 and was due to be decommissioned by 2017. Armenia’s former
government decided to extend the life of the 420-megawatt reactor after failing
to attract billions of dollars in funding for the construction of a new and
safer nuclear facility.
In 2015, the Russian government provided Yerevan with a $270 million loan and a
$30 million grant for major safety upgrades at Metsamor. Russian and Armenian
specialists essentially completed the modernization last year. Armenian
officials say the Soviet-built plant located 35 kilometers west of Yerevan is
safe enough to operate until 2036.
Vartanian indicated that the new plant would be built in time for the planned
decommissioning of the Metsamor reactor. He said the cost of the project depends
on the plant’s design capacity which is due to be recommended by the
Russian-Armenian task force.
The Russian side, the official went on, has already floated the idea of building
multiple and smaller reactors in Armenia.
“But I’m not sure that we will opt for building small modular energy blocks,” he
said, arguing that small reactors are not necessarily more cost-effective than
large ones.
Armenia, Azerbaijan To Start Talks On Border Demarcation
• Naira Nalbandian
ARMENIA -- Azerbaijani (L) and Armenian checkpoints at the Sotk gold mine on the
Armenian-Azerbaijani border, Gegharkunik province, June 18, 2021
Armenia and Azerbaijan have agreed to start negotiations on delimiting and
demarcating their long border, the Armenian Foreign Ministry announced on Monday.
The ministry said Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan and his Azerbaijani
counterpart Jeyhun Bayramov reached the agreement in what was their second phone
call in two weeks. The two sides will soon hold a “meeting regarding the
commission” on border demarcation, it said without giving any dates.
According to the ministry’s readout of the phone call, Mirzoyan and Bayramov
also discussed preparations for separate negotiations on an Armenian-Azerbaijani
peace treaty.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said, meanwhile, that he has already
appointed Azerbaijani negotiators two will discuss the treaty and border
demarcation with their Armenian counterparts.
It was not clear whether Yerevan has also named members of its two negotiating
teams. The Armenian government could not be reached for comment.
Aliyev and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian first agreed to form such a commission
during their trilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin last
November. However, it was not set up in the following months not least because
of confidence-building measures demanded by Yerevan.
Aliyev and Pashinian pledged to form the commission before the end of this month
during their April 6 talks in Brussels hosted by European Council President
Charles Michel. The latter said they also plan to “move rapidly” towards
negotiating the peace treaty.
Russian responded by accusing the European Union and the United States of trying
to hijack Russian efforts to broker peace between Armenia and Azerbaijan as part
of the ongoing geopolitical standoff over Ukraine.
In a joint declaration issued after their April 19 talks, Pashinian and Russian
President Vladimir Putin reaffirmed Moscow’s key role in the peace process. They
said they will speed up the planned creation of the border demarcation
commission.
“We are ready to provide advisory assistance to the bilateral Commission on
border delimitation, to provide the necessary cartographic materials,” a senior
Russian Foreign Ministry, Denis Gonchar, told the RIA Novosti news agency in an
interview published on Monday.
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
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