No loss should hold us back from our national goals, building a stronger state. Edmon Marukyan, Chairman of the Bright Armenia Party and ambassador-at-large of Armenia, told this to reporters Monday at Yerablur Military Pantheon.
"We have made many mistakes, and that is why we are in this situation today. This is a great lesson for all of us to restore what was lost. There is no alternative to building a strong state. If you do not build a strong state, you will lose future wars, too, your nation can become a victim of genocide," he said.
To the question whether he considers it possible that we can bring Shushi city of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) back during the rule of the incumbent Armenian authorities, Marukyan answered: "Nothing needs to be said, but needs to be done. When I say that a strong state should be built, everyone can see their dream in it. Now is not the time for any authorities of the Republic of Armenia—be it present, past or future—to show ambitions and boast against our enemies. Now is not the time for that, now is the time to build a strong state. If we had built that strong state after the previous victories, we would not have reached today. It is not necessary to say something, but to do something. (…). People, let's build our state first, have a strong and effective state."
Referring to the protest actions of the opposition, Marukyan mentioned that it is their right to hold such actions.
"The people have given them [parliamentary] opposition mandate to act. It is clear that many of them participated in order to com to power, not working as an opposition. But it turned out that way, it is the people's decision, this is the result. But the right of any political unit is to hold marches and demonstrations. But in the political sense I do not even see the worded issue," he said, in particular.
According to Marukyan, the agenda of the change of power put forward by the opposition has no content.
"You have to put content with it. Less than a year has passed since we went to the change of power. We dissolved the National Assembly, we went to the elections, let them come to power. The people did not bring them to power, did not elect them. What should we do? We were not elected either. What should we do? Let's demonstrate all day what we did not enter [parliament]?
If the actions of the current authorities really caused concern among the public, now there should have been half a million people on the streets. If this does not happen, then there is a misjudgment of the situation. If the people want a change of power, they will take to the streets and change the authorities. But it does not happen because there has just been an election and people want to live in peace."