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    Categories: 2022

RFE/RL Armenian Report – 05/17/2022

                                        Tuesday, May 17, 2022


Armenian Speaker Reticent About Karabakh’s Status
May 17, 2022
        • Astghik Bedevian

Armenia - Speaker Alen Simonian chairs a session of the National Assembly, 
Yerevan, September 13, 2021.


Parliament speaker Alen Simonian on Tuesday pointedly declined to say whether 
Armenia will champion Nagorno-Karabakh’s right to self-determination in 
negotiations on a peace treaty with Azerbaijan.

Responding to Azerbaijani proposals to negotiate such a treaty, the Armenian 
government has said that the question of Karabakh’s status must also be on the 
agenda of the talks. But it has not publicly clarified its position on the 
status or a mechanism for determining it.

Simonian, who is a key political ally of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian, was 
similarly reticent about the issue when he spoke to RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.

Asked whether Pashinian’s administration could recognize Karabakh as a part of 
Azerbaijan, he said: “As head of the legislative branch, I cannot be involved in 
the negotiating process or somehow predetermine it. The foreign minister, the 
head of the government will answer this question.”

Simonian also would not be drawn on the reason for Yerevan’s failure to mention 
the Karabakh Armenians’ right to self-determination it its written proposals on 
the peace talks communicated to Baku.

“The Armenian proposal is a proposal regarding the status, but that proposal 
regarding the status is a subject of discussions,” he said vaguely.

Speaking in 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, 
drawing strong criticism from his political opponents and Karabakh’s leadership.

The authorities in Stepanakert made clear that the Karabakh Armenians will never 
agree to live under Azerbaijani rule. Armenian opposition leaders charged, for 
their part, that Pashinian has agreed to Azerbaijani control over the disputed 
territory.

ARMENIA - Police officers detain opposition supporters who attempted to block 
streets in the capital Yerevan on May 17, 2022.

The opposition went on to launch daily street protests in Yerevan aimed at 
forcing Pashinian to step down.

“You must quit in order for Artsakh (Karabakh) to remain Armenian,” Ishkhan 
Saghatelian, one of the protest leaders, appealed to the prime minister as 
thousands of opposition supporters again marched through Yerevan on Tuesday.

Pashinian and his political allies have rejected the opposition demands.

Simonian said the ruling political team won a popular mandate to govern Armenia 
for the next five years in parliamentary elections held last June. He also 
rejected the opposition criticism of the government’s Karabakh policy.

“What does the opposition propose? Nothing,” said the speaker.



Yerevan Sees Rebound In Russian-Armenian Trade
May 17, 2022

Russia - Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with Armenian Prime Minister 
Nikol Pashinian, Moscow, May 16, 2022.


Armenia’s vital trade with Russia is showing signs of recovery after shrinking 
in the immediate aftermath of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Prime Minister 
Nikol Pashinian indicated late on Monday.

“Regarding the economy, I also want to note that after a certain decline in 
March, there is an intensification of bilateral economic relations looming,” 
Pashinian told Russian President Vladimir Putin at a meeting held following a 
Collective Security Treaty Organization summit in Moscow.

In his opening remarks at the meeting, Pashinian thanked Putin for “prodding 
Russian businesspeople to invest in Armenia.” He welcomed the “investment 
interest” shown by them but did not specify potential projects that could be 
launched soon.

Nor did he cite any projections regarding this year’s volume of Russian-Armenian 
trade. It rose by almost 21 percent, to $2.6 billion, in 2021. Russia thus 
solidified its status as Armenia’s number one trading partner.

Bilateral trade reportedly shrunk in March following the start of the war in 
Ukraine and the resulting Western sanctions imposed on Russia. Visiting Moscow 
last month, Armenian Economy Minister Kerobian said the two governments should 
work together to “urgently eliminate the causes of the decline and restore 
growth.”

Russia - Russian Industry and Trade Minister Denis Manturov (second from right) 
meets with Armenian Economy Minister Vahan Kerobian, Moscow, April 13, 2022.

Pashinian discussed the matter with Putin as well as Russian Prime Minister 
Mikhail Mishustin when he paid an official visit to Russia later in April. He 
spoke of “common challenges” facing Armenia and Russia.

Because of its close economic links with Russia, Armenia is expected to be 
significantly affected by the Western sanctions. The World Bank and the 
International Monetary Fund have said that economic growth in the South Caucasus 
country will slow down considerably this year.

The Central Bank of Armenia (CBA) likewise forecast modest growth in early 
March. It argued, in particular, that a sharp depreciation of the Russian ruble 
will have a negative impact on Armenian exports to Russia and remittances from 
Armenian migrant workers.

The ruble has rallied dramatically since then and is now stronger against the 
U.S. dollar and the euro than it was before the Russian invasion.



Hundreds Arrested As Armenian Opposition Keeps Up Protests
May 17, 2022
        • Artak Khulian

Armenia - Riot police detain an opposition protester in Yerevan, May 17, 2022.


The Armenian police made more than 400 arrests on Tuesday as opposition 
supporters again blocked roads across Yerevan in continuing protests aimed at 
forcing Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian to resign.

Groups of protesters began the blockages at 8 a.m. local time in an attempt to 
disrupt traffic and step up pressure on Pashinian’s government. Opposition 
leaders claimed to have blocked more than 50 streets in various parts of the 
capital.

Riot police stepped in to unblock the streets, clashing with protesters and 
detaining many of them. The police reported a total of 414 arrests in the 
afternoon, a daily record high since the start of the Armenian opposition’s 
“civil disobedience” campaign on May 1.

The protesters included members of Armenia’s parliament affiliated with its two 
opposition groups leading the campaign. Security forces tried to detain one of 
them, Tadevos Avetisian, but let him go after finding out that he is a 
parliament deputy.

Armenia - Opposition supporters block a street in Yerevan, May 17, 2022.

“This is not policing. This is hooliganism,” charged Lilit Galstian, another 
opposition lawmaker taking part in the protests.

Some citizens also condemned the police actions as they watched the dramatic 
scenes in the city center. They argued that the protests are peaceful.

“Nothing [wrong] was happening,” one woman told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “But 
they just rounded up [protesters] and took them away.”

The authorities insisted that the police restored public order and did not use 
disproportionate forces.

Mobile phone videos posted on social media showed dozens of defiant opposition 
supporters chanting anti-Pashinian slogans inside a police bus and a police 
station in Yerevan. They and all other detainees were expected to be released a 
few hours later.

Armenia - Riot police detain an opposition protester in Yerevan, May 17, 2022.
Ishkhan Saghatelian, an opposition leader, urged supporters to leave the streets 
at 11:30 a.m. and gather in the city’s France Square, the site of an opposition 
tent camp, in the evening.

“We have fully accomplished the task set by us,” Saghatelian said in a video 
message broadcast on Facebook. “We have demonstrated that the people are in 
control of the situation.”

Saghatelian said earlier that the opposition objective is to create “diarchy” 
that would make Pashinian’s resignation inevitable.

The prime minister and his political allies have rejected the opposition demands 
for his resignation fuelled by his recent statements on the Nagorno-Karabakh 
conflict.


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