Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan last week continued to advocate for his policy of appeasement towards Azerbaijan, suggesting that Armenians rather enjoy their lives than engage in eternal struggles.
Addressing the leaders of his political party, Civil Contract, on June 23, Pashinyan rhetorically asked: “Can we perceive the state as a means to make the well-being of and happiness of the people living here possible and not as a springboard, an outpost, for some eternal struggle? …Is the Republic of Armenia an instrument of eternal struggle or is the Republic of Armenia an instrument of living?”
This is the rosy promise that Pashinyan made to the people to come to power in 2018. He deceived the Armenian public by pledging to bring them peace and higher income. We now see that he brought nothing but death and misery to the nation after sacrificing thousands of soldiers, the entire territory of Artsakh, and parts of the Republic of Armenia. Contradicting his own criticisms of the previous regimes for increasing the national debt, he more than doubled it by borrowing billions of dollars from international financial institutions, thus placing a huge burden on future Armenian generations.
Pashinyan’s only accomplishment is creating a luxurious life for his own family by living in a government mansion, being driven in expensive cars, flying around the world in a luxurious government jet, and staying in five-star hotels in various capitals. In contrast, he came to the office on a bicycle six years ago.
In his June 23 remarks, Pashinyan fabricated two non-existent ‘challenges and threats’ that supposedly face the Armenian nations. He said:
1) “There are large countries, international big players, who tell us: ‘ …You are not really a living people; you are a suffering people. You have to suffer, you have to migrate, be slaughtered, have to struggle, and through all that, come and beg for salvation from me, and I have to come and save you.’”
2) Pashinyan said that the second challenge came from “Azerbaijan, especially Azerbaijan, whose words, to put it very briefly, are as follows: ‘You did not let me live for 30 years, I won’t let you live either, and I will take revenge on you.’”
Pashinyan provided in the above two defeatist statements the best evidence that he is not a competent leader which necessitates his immediate resignation, before he destroys the homeland.
First of all, no one in the world has said that Armenians must suffer. This is fake news. The only person that Armenians need to be saved from is Pashinyan. If Armenians want to continue their existence as a nation, they must replace Pashinyan as soon as possible with a more capable leader who could defend Armenia’s interests while ensuring the people’s proper living standards. These two goals are not mutually exclusive.
Secondly, why is Pashinyan acting as if he is the spokesman for Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev? Each time Pashinyan opens his mouth, one has distinct the impression that Aliyev is not sitting in Baku, but in Yerevan on the Armenian Prime Minister’s chair! Azerbaijanis did not suffer for 30 years. They lived perfectly well earning billions of dollars from exporting their oil and gas around the world, building multiple sky scrapers in Baku, and hosting prestigious international events and conferences. Even more astonishingly, since Pashinyan says that Aliyev is intent on seeking revenge from Armenia, why is he then begging Azerbaijan to sign a peace treaty? Will a piece of paper deter Aliyev from his fixation on seeking revenge from Armenia?
As if these absurd statements were not sufficient, Pashinyan spoke about “the reasons why ‘the opposition movement,’ led by Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, ‘has waned.’ Besides using outrageous lies to disparage the high-ranking clergyman, Pashinyan and his cohorts constantly repeat the fake notion that the opposition movement has failed. If the movement had really failed, why does Pashinyan keep talking about it? The truth is that Pashinyan and his followers are seriously worried about the Archbishop’s activities and his numerous followers. The regime’s concern is justified because for the first time in six years, one man has been able to unite the entire opposition field under one umbrella, something no one else has been able to accomplish until now!
By making such absurd statements, Pashinyan is simply trying to discourage his party members from giving up, like rats leaving a sinking ship. It is no secret that his followers in the Parliament and government are very worried about their jobs and incomes if the opposition succeeds in toppling the government. Furthermore, Pashinyan and his supporters seriously fear that they will be arrested and charged with corruption, abuse of power, violating the laws of the Republic of Armenia, and handing over Artsakh and the territories of the Republic of Armenia to Azerbaijan.
In recent days, Archbishop Galstanyan started to travel outside of Yerevan to gain supporters in other parts of the country. The Archbishop must form opposition groups in all villages and cities throughout Armenia to expand the movement beyond Yerevan, making it national in scope. The second benefit of spreading the protests throughout the country is to prevent Pashinyan from being able to bring thousands of policemen from all over the country to Yerevan to suppress the opposition protests. If there are simultaneous protests in all regions of Armenia on the same day, the police will be forced to remain in their local areas, thereby making it impossible for them to come to Yerevan in large numbers to attack the protesters.
Finally, since the opposition movement is also supported by Armenians in the Diaspora, the Archbishop must appoint his movement’s representatives in various countries so it becomes a pan-Armenian worldwide movement rather than being limited to just Yerevan or Armenia.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan met on June 19 with a group of Diaspora Armenians who worked as temporary staff members at various Ministries in Armenia.
During his remarks to the group, the Prime Minister deviated from the subject matter and made senseless statements about the Diaspora. He said that “… in a large part of our history, during the history of the Third Republic, the Diaspora has often or sometimes been viewed as an auxiliary institution to the administration of the Republic of Armenia. The change that is occurring is as follows: we say that the Diaspora cannot be an auxiliary institution to the administration of the Republic of Armenia because the Republic of Armenia, like any state, is an instrument with its clear mechanisms where it is very clearly described who and how is managing that mechanism. If there is no detail or larger whole in the architecture of that mechanism, we are trying to connect that whole to that mechanism; we are inhibiting the progress of that mechanism. This is obvious. And in this logic, I think that the change that is taking place is very important and very essential. But, on the other hand, I want to look at it with reverse logic as well. In many cases, the Republic of Armenia was also perceived as an auxiliary or non-auxiliary tool for the administration of the Diaspora. I want to say that, in my understanding, this also needs to end. Why? Because in case we make the Republic of Armenia an auxiliary or non-auxiliary tool, we are placing the Republic of Armenia outside the limits of its jurisdiction and, therefore, we make the Republic of Armenia more vulnerable. Our strategy, which I have talked about, the conceptual framework of ensuring the security of the Republic of Armenia, is legitimacy which is also related to this — that we can act only where we have jurisdiction and legitimacy to act. We cannot act where we don’t have jurisdiction and legitimacy to act as a state. And because of this circumstance, social-psychological changes will inevitably take place in Armenia-Diaspora relations as well. I described what should not be as we had pictured. I mean, I understand that there is a certain gap within what I said, but I am not ready today to even attempt to fill that gap because I don’t think that’s my job or at least only my job. That requires wider discussions, and there, the Republic of Armenia or officials of the Republic of Armenia can have a say, say something, but I think that these discussions are more public and informal level discussions about how should be the new relations between Armenia and the Diaspora. They are no longer like that and will not be like that. I think that is obvious….”
If you understood nothing from Pashinyan’s rambling words, you are not alone. The problem is that he always speaks without a prepared text causing him to stray from the subject and say things that he had not planned to say.
In his lengthy statement, Pashinyan tried to refute a thought that did not exist in anyone’s mind — that “the Diaspora is viewed as an auxiliary institution to the management of the Republic of Armenia.” No one had said that. We have always envisaged the Diaspora’s role as providing humanitarian aid, investments and professional expertise to the homeland.
On the positive side, I am glad Pashinyan acknowledged that Armenia has no jurisdiction to meddle in the internal affairs of the Diaspora. He has great difficulty managing the problems facing Armenia, let alone the issues of the Diaspora — something he knows nothing about.
Pashinyan then strayed into the subject of ‘how many Armenians are there in the world.’ He said: “…There is another problem. We do not always attach big significance to arithmetic. Recently, a question arose in my head. We keep saying, ‘10 million Armenians, 10 million Armenians, 10 million Armenians.’ Is there a list of these Armenians somewhere or not? I am convinced that there isn’t. Here again is the phenomenon of sanctification. That number is sacred, do not touch it suddenly. It neither increases nor decreases. You cannot change it. It’s 10 million! If someone says that ‘it’s not 10 million, it’s 10,561,000,’ everyone will attack him and say, ‘ignorant, dilettante. How do you know that? Who counted it, etc.?’ If someone says: ‘no, it’s 9,200,000,’ they will say, ‘you scoundrel, you are belittling the global influence of Armenians. With the stroke of a pen, you wiped out 800,000 Armenians.’ This is our reality. This is about us, but we have to talk about it. If we don’t talk about it, what is the use?”
The Prime Minister is wrong that no one knows the number of Armenians in the world. He could have checked Wikipedia under the topic of ‘Armenian population by country,’ which lists the approximate number of Armenians in each one of 107 countries. There are many other sources that give the number of Armenians in the world. Since no one has counted every single Armenian in the world, naturally, the 10 million is a rough estimate.
If this subject really interests the Prime Minister, he should direct his High Commissioner for Diaspora Affairs to conduct a worldwide survey and compile a more accurate number of Armenians in the world.
I also suggest that the Prime Minister’s aides write his speeches, so he can read from a written text and not stray into whatever comes to his head at the moment.
The Armenian government had two options to resolve peacefully the popular uprising against the regime:
1) Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan could have resigned, turning over the reins of power to a coalition government which in six months would hold new parliamentary elections and choose a new Prime Minister;
2) Pashinyan could have accepted the offer of the new leader of the opposition, Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, to sit down with him and discuss a negotiated solution to the current political crisis.
Regrettably, Pashinyan chose neither one of the above options. He chose to attack the opposition by having his “well-fed” police beat and arrest a large number of protesters, including journalists and even clergymen, some of whom are in a hospital recovering from injuries they suffered at the hands of the police. The Prime Minister has secured the blind loyalty of the police officers by increasing their salaries several times and giving them constant bonuses. It is said that there are more policemen in the streets of Armenian cities than soldiers protecting the country’s borders.
This is not surprising since Pashinyan, as an incompetent and inexperienced leader has mismanaged just about every decision he has made in the past six years. He is stubbornly clinging to his seat of power, dealing a mortal blow to the survival of the country.
After initially calling his takeover of power a “velvet revolution,” Pashinyan quickly switched to what he described as a “steel revolution.” Incredibly, he campaigned during the parliamentary elections of 2021, holding a hammer in his hand and promising to bash the heads of his domestic opponents. He also threatened to slam them into the wall and flatten them on the asphalt. Furthermore, Pashinyan boasted that no judge would dare to deviate from his orders. Even though the Prime Minister claims to be a democrat, his behavior is more like that of a dictator. Pashinyan came to power in 2018 closing down the streets of Yerevan, ordering his followers to block the entrances of the Parliament and courthouses, smashing the doors of the State Radio station, and violating many other laws. However, when the opposition is now peacefully walking in the streets or even on the sidewalks, they are brutally attacked, punched and arrested by the ever-present police.
Not surprisingly, the heads of Azerbaijan and Turkey have expressed their concern about Pashinyan remaining in power. Some Azeri and Turkish analysts even suggested that their countries dispatch armed troops to Armenia to protect Pashinyan, so he can continue making concessions.
Another indication that Pashinyan is working against the interests of Armenia is the support he is getting from the West because he is doing what they are telling him to do which is in their interest, but contrary to the national interests of Armenia.
Western countries only pay lip service to human rights, but maintain good relations with even the most dictatorial regimes in the world. That is the reason why not one critical word has been said by any Western state while Pashinyan’s police is brutalizing Armenia’s citizens.
Fortunately, several non-governmental international organizations have condemned the lack of human rights in Armenia and criticized police brutality.
On May 28, five major non-governmental organizations issued a joint statement against “mass detention” of protesters, “violence against some participants” and physical assault against a member of the Armenian Parliament which is a violation of Armenia law. The five organizations are: Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly Vanadzor Office, Transparency International Anticorruption Center, Protection of Rights without Borders NGO, Law Development and Protection Foundation, and Democracy Development Foundation.
The joint statement deplored that Armenian law enforcement officers “continue to engage in unlawful and disproportionate use of force, illegal detentions, and violations of the right to liberty during the exercise of the right to freedom of assembly. The use of such methods by the police is the result of a longstanding policy of impunity within the system, leading to the use of violent force becoming the main tool of the police.”
The joint statement further said that citizens have the freedom for peaceful assembly and the right to express their opinions freely “without fear of police violence.”
Reporters Without Borders issued a separate statement calling “for an end to deliberate police violence against reporters.” At least five journalists were targeted by the police.
The U.S. Freedom House also issued a statement saying: “We are concerned by mounting reports of police violence in Armenia. We urge Armenian authorities to investigate this pattern of excessive force and inhumane treatment and work with civil society to foster and implement meaningful reform.”
The most shameful behavior was Pashinyan’s order to obstruct the entry of Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II into the Sardarapat Memorial on May 28, Armenia’s Independence Day. To make matters worse, the Prime Minister lied when he was asked why the Catholicos and his entourage of clergy were hindered from placing a wreath at the Memorial, is a public venue.
All police officers and government officials must be aware that after Pashinyan is gone they will be held responsible for their illegal and anti-Armenian actions.
Even since Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan with his thousands of followers started marching towards Yerevan, many wondered what would happen on May 9 once they reached the Republic Square where Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s offices are located.
After arriving in Yerevan, Bagrat Srpazan gave one hour to Pashinyan to resign. When the hour was over and he did not resign, Srpazan announced that there would be acts of civil disobedience throughout the country beginning the next day. He urged his followers to act peacefully and not to commit any acts of violence.
Pashinyan was hoping that the number of protesters would dwindle over time and the movement would fizzle out. The regime did everything in its power to vilify and defame Srpazan and the protesters. Government propagandists announced that there were merely around 20,000 protesters in the Republic Square on May 9, whereas most observers estimated the crowd to be several times larger. After misleading the Armenian public for six years with thousands of lies, Pashinyan continued his deceptive practices by claiming without any evidence that the protesters are Kremlin’s agents who were paid money to participate in these protests. Government leaders ridiculed not only Srpazan, but also the Armenian Church, an institution that has shepherded the nation ever since 301 AD, particularly during the absence of an Armenian state.
To the disappointment of Prime Minister’s diminishing number of supporters, as his rating has gone down from 80% six years ago to 8% now, Srpazan held a second rally in the Republic Square with tens of thousands of followers in attendance. Despite the brutal actions of Pashinyan’s police which viciously attacked the peaceful protesters, the movement grew stronger rather than fizzling out. During the past week, Srpazan held separate meetings with groups of lawyers, doctors, retired military officers, artists, and dozens of opposition leaders.
Srpazan proved the falsehood of Pashinyan followers’ repeated mantra that no one else can replace the Prime Minister. Srpazan succeeded for the first time to unite the various opposition groups under his leadership. Large segments of the public, livid at Pashinyan’s defeatist concessions to Azerbaijan, responded enthusiastically to Srpazan’s peaceful, but urgent message for change.
Finally, Srpazan’s long-awaited big rally took place on May 26 during which several important announcements were made. The crowd was told that Srpazan would temporarily replace Pashinyan after which a coalition government will be formed, followed by parliamentary elections which will choose a new Prime Minister. Even though the Constitution requires that the Prime Minister be exclusively a citizen of Armenia for the preceding four years, Srpazan’s followers believe that his dual citizenship of Armenia and Canada would not prevent him from temporarily acting as Prime Minister. Srpazan made the commitment that he will be guided exclusively by legal requirements. Ironically, Pashinyan’s regime, which has violated just about every existing law, is demanding that the protesters comply with the laws of the country.
During the May 26 rally, Srpazan also announced that after consulting with other high-ranking clergymen and Catholicos Karekin II, it was decided that he will freeze his 30-year-long spiritual service in order not to combine political activities with his religious position.
Srpazan is attempting to topple Pashinyan the same way the latter toppled Prime Minister Serzh Sargsyan. Pashinyan and his followers violated dozens of laws to come to power, blocking the streets, the Parliament building, the courthouse, and smashing the locked doors of the Armenian radio station. However, Pashinyan thinks that he is the only one who can get away with breaking the law. Amazingly, he even boastfully proclaimed: “is there a judge in Armenia who cannot do what the Prime Minister says?” If anyone else does what he did, his barbaric police are ordered, as he himself announced during the Parliamentary campaign in 2021 while holding a hammer in his hand, to smash the heads of his Armenian opponents, even though he falsely claims to be a democrat. Ironically, Pashinyan never uses such vile language against the real enemies of Armenia — Azerbaijan and Turkey — whose leaders make the most offensive comments about Armenia.
At the end of the mass rally in the Republic Square on May 26, Srpazan marched with his followers to the Prime Minister’s mansion and demanded that he meet with him and tell him to resign. However, it turned out that Pashinyan was not at home, visiting the flooded areas of Northern Armenia.
Srpazan then led the large crowd back to the Republic Square where the rally had started several hours earlier. He urged his followers to engage in acts of civil disobedience throughout the country to pressure Pashinyan to resign.
This is Armenia’s last chance to save the country from Pashinyan, a defeated and incompetent leader, who is willing to follow Aliyev’s and Azerbaijan’s orders, and make illegal and endless one-sided concessions, until the total loss of Armenia, after the loss of Artsakh!
On 24th April each year Yerevan issues its standard message commemorating the “Armenian Genocide” of 1915. This is usually a matter of routine. But not this year. The statement issued by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has led to him being called a “denialist” by the Armenian diaspora and the Genocide industry in the US and elsewhere in the West.
Here are the relevant parts of Pashinyan’s statement that have attracted the ire of those with a stake in the Genocide accusation:
“Dear people, dear citizens of the Republic of Armenia,
Today we commemorate the memory of 1.5 million victims of the Armenian Genocide, the Meds Yeghern, who were put to the sword in the Ottoman Empire since 1915 for being Armenians.
This large-scale tragedy took place during the years of the World War I, and the Armenian people, who had no statehood at the time, having lost their statehood centuries ago, had essentially forgotten the tradition of statehood, and became victims of geopolitical intrigues and false promises, lacking first of all a political mind capable of making the world and its rules understandable.
Meds Yeghern became a nationwide tragedy and grief for us, and without exaggeration, is now a predetermining factor for our socio-psychology. Even today, we perceive the world, our environment, ourselves under the dominant influence of the mental trauma of the Meds Yeghern, and we have not been able to overcome that trauma.
This means that… we often relate and compete with other countries and the international community in a state of mental trauma, and for this reason, sometimes we cannot correctly distinguish the realities and factors, historical processes and projected horizons confronting us.
Maybe this is also the reason why we receive new shocks, and relive the trauma of the Armenian Genocide as both a legacy and as a tradition… When talking about the Armenian Genocide, the Meds Yeghern, we always talk to the outside world, but our internal conversation never takes place on this event.
What should we do and what should we not do in order to overcome the trauma of genocide and exclude it as a threat? These are questions that should be the key subject of discussion in our political and philosophical thinking, but this kind of point of view of dealing with the fact of the Meds Yeghern is not common among us.
This is an imperative, an urgent imperative, and we must evaluate the relations between the Meds Yeghern and the First Republic of Armenia, we must relate the perception of the Meds Yeghern with the vital interests of the Republic of Armenia, our national statehood…
We must now stop the searches for a “national homeland” because we have already found that homeland, our Promised Land, where milk and honey flow. For us, the commemoration of the martyrs of the Meds Yeghern should not symbolize the “lost homeland”, but the found and real homeland, in the person of the Republic of Armenia, whose state… policies can prevent a repetition.
Never again! We should not say this to others, but to ourselves. And this is not an accusation against us at all, but a point of view where we, and only we, are responsible for the directing of our destiny and we are obliged to have enough mind, will, and depth of knowledge to carry through that responsibility in the domain of our sovereign decisions and perceptions.
May the martyrs of Meds Yeghern and all our other martyrs be consoled in their permanent sleep by the Republic of Armenia.
And long live the Republic of Armenia.”
It has been noticed that in his statement of April 24th, 2024, the Armenian Prime Minister chose to continually refer to the event the diaspora has been promoting for the last 50 years as “the Armenian Genocide” as Meds Yeghern or “the Great Crime”. He used the Genocide term extremely sparingly, almost in derogatory fashion against its diasporan promoters. Meds Yeghern is the term that Armenians used until the 1940’s to describe the events of 1915 before the term Genocide was coined by Raphael Lemkin and applied by the Armenian diaspora in its campaign for reparations against the Turkish state since the 1970s. Since then, there has been an insistence that the proper and legal term that should be used is “Genocide” or Tseghasbanoutyoun, in Armenian.
What Pashinyan seems to be suggesting is that Armenia should stop its myth-making and deal with the realities of situations as they present themselves. In other words it should stop treating propaganda as fact because propaganda is a poor basis for policy and Armenia’s recent disasters are very much connected with this tendency. In line with this he has suggested, in line with Azerbaijan President Aliyev’s demand, that Armenia adopt a new constitution deleting the references to “Artsakh” and “the Armenian Genocide”.
One of Pashinyan’s top lieutenants’ has also made the suggestion of making a list of all “1.5 million victims of the Armenian Genocide”. This has been seen by the Armenian diaspora as an indirect way of questioning the veracity of the “Armenian Genocide” and part of a policy of appeasment toward Azerbaijan and Turkiye.
The Lemkin Institute, horrified that its raison d’etre has been questioned by the Armenian Prime Minister, no less, issued a very lengthy and detailed statement saying:
“While we do not generally involve ourselves in domestic affairs of states unless there is an internal threat of genocide, we must address concerns stemming from recent statements made by Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan that appear to diverge from fundamental principles of genocide prevention, genocide recognition, and transitional justice, and that directly relate to issues of Armenian national security.”
The Lemkin Institute statement then seeks to refute Pashinyan’s own statement published on April 24th:
“Perhaps most striking about Pashinyan’s statement on the genocide was the absence of any mention of aggressors. In paragraph three, for example, Pashinyan — discussing the period in the Ottoman Empire leading up to the 1915 genocide — cryptically asserted that “…the Armenian people, who had no statehood, had lost their statehood centuries ago, and essentially had forgotten the tradition of statehood, became victims of geopolitical intrigues and false promises, lacking first of all a political mind capable of making the world and its rules understandable.” This statement seems to assert that Armenians mysteriously experienced genocide due to their own witlessness. By asserting that Armenians were solely “victims of geopolitical intrigues and false promises,” Pashinyan further disregards the long-term and multi-layered historical oppression of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire as well as the deep and visceral contempt for Armenians among members of the Committee of Union and Progress, the ruling party during the genocide. In other words, Pashinyan’s statement fails to recognize the role played by the ethnic, religious, and cultural animosity for Armenians in the Turkic supremacist campaign of extermination that targeted Armenians during World War I.
Furthermore, instead of attributing blame for the genocide to the leaders of the Ottoman Empire during World War I, Pashinyan redirects attention towards Armenians, and specifically their apparent incapacity to understand politics at the time. He appears to be referencing the actions of the Russian Empire and Western powers during that era, who promised to protect Armenians but did not follow through, which aggravated the Ottoman leaders’ sense of external threat to the empire and drew negative attention to the Armenians as ‘foreign agents’. However, he does not state this outright; instead he seems to believe that Armenians brought the genocide upon themselves by misunderstanding the political terrain. Pashinyan’s talking points in this passage seem ironic, given that he has himself embraced Western offers to save Armenia from its hostile neighbors. Yet, his talking points also echo the official position of Türkiye regarding the Armenian Genocide which justified it by contracting “against an onslaught of external invaders and internal nationalist independence movements”. By parroting the Turkish narrative of the events of 1915-1923, the Armenian Prime Minister risks absolving Türkiye of its responsibility for the Armenian Genocide, downplaying all previous acknowledgment efforts. Further, it may substantially hamper the continuing work on international recognition of the Armenian Genocide and Turkish accountability – something that the worldwide Armenian diaspora, as well as genocide scholars and activists, have been fighting for.
Pashinyan’s argument that “Armenian people, who had no statehood, had lost their statehood centuries ago, and essentially had forgotten the tradition of statehood” inexplicably plays into the denialist agenda of Türkiye and Azerbaijan by obliquely mischaracterizing Armenian efforts to gain equal rights and human security in the Ottoman empire with foolish attempts to exercise a quest for independent statehood for which they had no capacity. The vast majority of Armenians under Ottoman rule were not seeking secession, but rather security and justice. Pashinyan’s words directly echo the official Turkish view of the Armenian people as rebellious “traitors” who collaborated with hostile European powers to bring about the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, and who therefore betrayed the country. In fact, in this passage, Pashinyan seems to be making the case that Armenians can only avoid future genocides by capitulating to present-day Türkiye’s expansionist designs.”
It must be admitted that the Armenian Prime Minister has a better understanding of Armenian history than the propagandists in the Genocide industry.
Just after the Great War of August 1914 began in Europe a delegation of Young Turks attended the 8th Dashnak Congress held at Erzurum, in Ottoman eastern Anatolia. There they made an offer to the Armenians to secure their loyalty in the event of the War coming to the Ottoman territories – so as to preserve stability in the territories in which the Armenians lived.
That the Ottomans should have hosted the Dashnak Congress as the Great War was beginning reveals something about the good intentions of the Committee of Union and Progress (New/Young Turks). For most of the previous decade the Dashnaks had sat in the Ottoman parliament, Armenians had been Ottoman ministers and there had been genuine attempts at reform, which were to be supervised by International inspectors, in the eastern vilayets where the Armenians mostly lived.
At this Congress the Ottomans offered the Dashnaks the thing they had been struggling for over the previous 30 years – autonomy.
The Ottoman Government sent a delegation of 28 CUP members, representing all the ethnic groups of the Empire, including important individuals like Behaeddin Shakir and Naji Bey, to make an offer to the Armenians – who were observed to be moving toward supporting a Russian assault on the Empire.
There is a detailed account of the offer made to the Dashnaks at their Congress in Erzurum in a book written by Morgan Philips Price, a pro-Armenian British Liberal, who later became a Labour M.P. He acted for C.P. Scott as The Manchester Guardian’s Caucasus correspondent during the Great War:
“At the outbreak of the European war the Committee of Union and Progress became all-powerful, and all reform schemes and reconciliation plans fell to the ground. The Armenian party, “Dashnaktsution”, happened to be holding a conference at Erzerum when the war began. Turkey had not yet entered; but at the beginning of August Hilmi Bey, Behadin Shekir Bey, and Nedji Bey were delegated by the Committee to make certain proposals to the Armenians in the event of war with Russia. These delegates arrived at Erzerum at the end of the month, and their first proposal was that the Armenians should observe complete neutrality, the population of Armenia and the Trans-Caucasus doing its military duty, to whatever Empire it owed allegiance.
This the Armenians accepted, and all seemed to point to an agreement. But a few days later the Turks suddenly made another proposal. Turkey, they said, could never be secure until there was a chain of buffer States between her and her arch-enemy, Russia, and they claimed that, if war broke out, the Armenians should assist them in carrying out their plan. They then produced a map of the Middle East in which the following political divisions were made. Russia was to be pushed back to the Cossack steppes beyond the main range of the Caucasus. Tiflis and the Black Sea coast, with Batum and Kutais, were marked as belonging to an autonomous province of Georgia. The central part of the Trans-Caucasus, with Kars, Alexandropol and Erivan, were to be joined to the vilayets of Van, Bitlis, and East Erzerum, as an autonomous Armenia. Eastern Trans-Caucasia, including Baku, Elizabetopol and Dagestan were to become an autonomous province of Shiite Tartars. The Armenians, feeling the impossibility of the Ottoman Empire ever being able to realize such a grandiose scheme… refused to have anything to do with the proposal. So the Young Turk delegates, unable to make any impression in Erzerum, proceeded to Van, where they met with no greater success.
According to statements made to me during 1915 by prominent Van Armenians, it is clear that the action of the Tiflis Dashnakists, about which the Committee of Union and Progress had doubtless been informed by the end of August, was the principal cause of these Turkish demands. Early in August 1914 the Tiflis Armenians seem to have decided that a Russo-Turkish war was inevitable, and thereupon the Dashnakist leaders there at once offered 25,000 volunteers to assist the Russians in conquering the Armenian vilayets.
This offer was made before the outbreak of the war with Turkey, and in the interval the volunteers were busy training and forming at the various centres in the Caucasus. At the end of October, when Turkey came into the war, preparations had been so far advanced that Andranik, the famous revolutionary leader from Turkey, at the head of the first volunteer battalion, took part with the Russians in the advance through North-west Persia, capturing Serai early in November. Meanwhile five more battalions had been formed and were ready to leave for the front, as soon as they could get rifles and equipment. Fifty per cent, of these volunteers were Armenians who had left Turkey, Bulgaria and Roumania since the outbreak of the European war, and had come to the Caucasus to offer their services.
There can be little doubt that this volunteer movement, started under the auspices of the Caucasus Armenians, was the cause of the Young Turk demands on the Armenians of Erzerum, Van and Bitlis for a similar volunteer movement against Russia, and of the subsequent persecution when this demand was refused. Prominent Armenians, whom I met in Van, told me how the attitude of Djevdet Pasha towards them and their people became much more unfriendly as soon as the news arrived that Armenian volunteers were on the front fighting against the Turks. He at once demanded the return of a number of Armenian deserters, whose absence had hitherto been winked at. He accused them of going over to the volunteers with the Russians, and commenced the policy of forcing the Armenians into special labour battalions, where they had very hard work and bad food. Thus the Van Armenians were at the mercy of the Turks, who avenged on them all the rash acts of their kinsmen in the Caucasus.
That their conduct was keenly resented by the Turkish Armenian refugees in the Caucasus, was made clear by some articles in the Van Tosp, the organ of the Van Armenians in Tin as early in 1916. In its issue for January 9th, 1916, Professor Minassian took the Dashnaktsution party to task for having entered into negotiations with the Russian authorities without consulting its kindred societies in Turkish Armenia. It had spread, he said, baseless rumours of a Russian promise of autonomy for Armenia, and then had proceeded to organize volunteer battalions, regardless of the effect that this would have on their kinsmen in Turkey, whose position under the nose of the Turks was very precarious and required tactful handling. He denied that there was any serious negotiation with the Russian Government about Armenian autonomy, and said that the Dashnaktsution leaders of the Caucasus were pretending to represent responsible opinion, whereas they really only represented a group. The Orizon, the organ of the Dashnaktsution in Tiflis, defended itself by saying that the massacre would have happened in any case, and that Prince Vorontsoff Dashkoff had not only verbally promised Armenian autonomy in return for the service of the volunteers, but had actually signed a document to this effect. Whether this document ever existed is however exceedingly doubtful.” (War and Revolution in Asiatic Russia, pp.243-6)
The Armenians turned the Ottoman offer down and instead joined the Tsarist invasion and mounted an insurrection against the Ottoman state. That proved to be a fateful effor with the most tragic of results.
The CUP mission offered the Armenians autonomy in 2 and a half vilayets of East Erzurum, Van and Bitlis plus “Russian Armenia” in return for service in the Ottoman army in the event of war and support from their brethren in Russian territory, who would then, in the event of victory, be part of the larger autonomous region. The offer would be guaranteed by the German Government. The CUP delegation proposed that the Dashnaks aid the Ottoman State by mounting attacks on any Russian invasion behind the lines in Transcaucasia, where an autonomous Armenian state could be founded.
In the 2 and a half vilayets of Turkish Armenia this would have placed around 1 million Muslims under the authority of an autonomous Armenia containing only around 400,000 Armenians. So it was undoubtedly a generous concession on the Ottoman side (see Justin McCarthy, Turks and Armenians: Nationalism and Conflict in the Ottoman Empire, p.10) According to the 1897 Tsarist figures the Armenian population of the autonomous area would have been increased by another 1 million from the Kars, Erivan and Alexandropol Russian guberniyas (although this area would have also contained a sizeable amount of Muslims. By 1917 the Russians counted 1.4 million Christians in Russian Armenia and 670,000 Moslems).
So, an Armenian autonomous region, with “Russian Armenia” included, under Ottoman sovereignty would have perhaps been made viable by a small majority of Armenians – something that all the Armenian territorial claims were incapable of delivering without the extensive ethnic cleansing of Muslims.
This was the concrete realisation, to all intents and purposes, of the deal the Dashnaks had concluded with the Young Turks in 1907. It was more realistic and realisable than the choice the Dashnaks subsequently took in throwing in their lot with Russian expansionism and British Imperialism.
It could be said that the Dashnaks backed the wrong horse, believing it to be the more powerful one, more likely to win. They were taken in by the promises and propaganda of the Triple Entente – Britain, France and Russia – and paid an awful price for it.
Prime Minister Pashinyan, therefore, has a point. Armenians should grasp this historic opportunity to forget altogether about the myths around “Greater Armenia” and instead concentrate all efforts in improving the lives of Armenians living in the actual Armenia. The ideology of “Greater Armenia” and the “Armenian Genocide” combined, at the collapse of the USSR, to impel Armenia to seize a large portion of Azerbaijan where there was a sizeable Armenian population and which Armenian history had taught was a part of “historic Armenia”. In the course of this conquest there were fearsome massacres of Azerbaijani civilians and over 750,000 were driven from their homes to become internally displaced persons in other parts of Azerbaijan. And the US diaspora volunteeers, led by Monte Melkonian, conducted the notorious Khojaly massacre.
The seizure of Karabakh and the surrounding regions and ethnic cleansing of its population was justified not only on irredentist grounds but with reference to the events of 1915. Azerbaijani Turks could not be allowed to live in Karabakh because these “Turks” were, after all the same Turks as 1915!
The “Armenian Genocide” narrative also chained Armenia to its Russian “protector” after the breakup of the Soviet Union. Armenia was in need of a “protector” after what it did in Karabakh in the early 1990s and Moscow was indeed happy to oblige. This had a consequent retarding effect on Armenia’s post-Soviet national independence and development when the route to the West went through Turkiye. Pashinyan is very aware of this.
One of the first acts of the current US President upon coming to power was to recognise the “Armenian Genocide.” And now that same “caller out” of genocides is the essential facilitator of the clearest case of attempted genocide seen in modern times.
Perhaps that is concentrating the mind of the Armenian Prime Minister and making him into something of a statesman.
A lot has happened in Armenia this past week that has shaken to the core the incompetent, inexperienced, defeatist and deceptive Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan who should have resigned on Nov. 10, 2020, the day he signed the capitulation agreement with Azerbaijan.
Pashinyan came to power by exploiting the people’s gullibility and their resentment of the former leaders. He claimed that he will bring peace to Armenia, their sons will no longer die in wars, they will live in prosperity with high-paying jobs, there will be no corruption, and a million other falsehoods with which he misled the public.
Drunk with his newly-found power, Pashinyan became completely unhinged. He arrogantly announced, while he and his mob of followers surrounded the Parliament building in 2018, that either he will become the Prime Minister or Armenia will not have a Prime Minister! This is the pronouncement of a self-declared democratic leader who became a dictator.
During the campaign for the parliamentary elections in 2021, Pashinyan stood on a stage holding a hammer and promising to crush the heads of his political opponents. He also pledged to slam his Armenian rivals to the wall and flatten them on the asphalt. This is his crude understanding of democracy.
Pashinyan told his crowd of followers in 2018 that he will leave his office when the people demand his resignation. Since then, he has ignored all demands for his resignation clinging to his seat of power. During one of the many demonstrations calling for his resignation, when a journalist asked him if he will keep his word and resign, he pompously replied, “they aren’t people,” implying that he considers only those who support him as “people.”
Even though Pashinyan’s supporters falsely claim that he was elected Prime Minister, the fact is that he was not, since the Prime Minister’s post is not an elective position. He was chosen by his parliamentary majority which is composed of equally incompetent and inexperienced young men and women.
Pashinyan has no tolerance for dissent. If anyone living in Armenia dares to criticize him, the Prime Minister orders his well-fed police squad to lay the critic on the ground, beat him up and arrest him. His top ally, Alen Simonyan, the Chairman of the Parliament, spit on the face of an Armenian in the street, just because he criticized him. And if a Diaspora Armenian disagrees with Pashinyan, he will not be allowed to enter Armenia after he arrives at the Yerevan Airport. Under Pashinyan, Armenia has become a dictatorship, ruled by the whims of one man.
Now comes Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, the Primate of the Diocese of Tavoush, who opposes Pashinyan’s arbitrary decision to turn over to Azerbaijan four Armenian border villages without a referendum and parliamentary approval.
The Archbishop has come immediately under vicious attacks by Pashinyan himself and his cronies, including the thousands of fake Facebook followers who are paid to defame anyone who dares to criticize the Prime Minister.
Pashinyan called the Archbishop and his supporters “Drug Lords” and “Foreign Agents sent from overseas” without a shred of evidence. It is very ugly when the head of a government uses street language to denigrate his political opponents. Anyone who dares to criticize Pashinyan is immediately labeled “a Kremlin agent” who is paid thousands of dollars to “undermine the country.” Why should anyone get paid to undermine Armenia when Pashinyan is already undermining the country all by himself?
In a strange turn of events, the Archbishop has copied the same tactic Pashinyan used to come to power by marching from Gyumri to Yerevan in 2018. Thus Srpazan is giving Pashinyan a dose of his own medicine. The only difference is that Pashinyan violated many laws to come to power by smashing the doors of the Armenian Radio Station’s headquarters, surrounding a Court House with his followers to prevent the judges from entering the building, and blocking the entrances to the Parliament.
The Archbishop has advantages and disadvantages. Srpazan is a clergyman whose weapon is truth and morality. He preaches peace, love and non-violence. All attempts by various opposition groups to topple Pashinyan by street protests in the past six years have failed. The Archbishop is the only person who has gained the trust of a large number of Armenians who eagerly joined his march from Tavoush to Yerevan. Over 100,000 Armenians flooded the city’s main square to listen to his message.
When Srpazan arrived in Yerevan on May 9, he announced that he was giving Pashinyan one hour to resign. When the hour passed and there was no resignation, the Archbishop did not want to go to the next step of urging his 100,000 followers to storm the building and oust the Prime Minister. Instead, Srpazan announced a series of civil disobedience acts throughout the country.
Srpazan is now consulting with various opposition leaders to discuss the next steps. If and when Pashinyan resigns or is impeached, both unlikely scenarios, the Archbishop said that a transition government will be formed which will later hold elections for Parliament to choose a new Prime Minister. It remains to be seen if Srpazan’s peaceful plans will succeed to oust Pashinyan.
The best reason for getting rid of Pashinyan is that the presidents of Azerbaijan and Turkey have eagerly praised Pashinyan for his repeated and endless concessions. Prominent Azeri analyst Ali Hajizade even suggested the possibility of sending Azeri and Turkish troops to Yerevan to support Pashinyan’s government!
All patriotic Armenians, putting aside their internal differences, should form a coalition to establish a transitional government that will hold the next elections. Public pressure must be exerted on Pashinyan to resign as soon as possible before the country ceases to exist due to attacks by internal and external enemies. This may be the last chance to save Armenia.
