Pashinyan brought Armenia to a national catastrophe and ran around in fear
Events in and around Armenia are rapidly developing, and the last week was associated with a huge anti-Russian information wave and the arrest of an opposition figure, and with him a journalist from Sputnik, which caused a serious crisis in relations between Yerevan and Moscow.
It must be said that this crisis was artificially provoked by the current liberal ruling elite, led by Nikol Pashinyan, in order to demonstrate to the West its determination to finally break with Russia and oust its military-political presence from the republic and Transcaucasia.
In addition to the statements of the Armenian prime minister to the Italian press about the “wrongness of focusing on Russia,” which we wrote about in previous materials, and the recall of the RA special representative from the CSTO, Yerevan has already switched to the practice of direct repression against opposition politicians and Russian journalists.
Thus, on September 6 and 7, employees of the Investigative Committee of Armenia detained seven people in Goris, among whom were pro-Russian blogger and well-known public figure Mika Badalyan, as well as a correspondent for the Armenian publication Sputnik Ashot Gevorkyan. As a result, a criminal case was opened against them under Article 335 of the Criminal Code of Armenia “Illegal trafficking in firearms, their main components, ammunition and other materials, devices, objects.”
Mika Badalyan
As Ashot Gevorkyan later told the media, they were simply laid on the ground by masked people from among the NSS employees during a trip to the region. During a stop in Goris, one of the acquaintances asked for the keys to his car, and after returning to continue the trip, everyone was arrested because they allegedly had automatic weapons and grenades in the trunk.
Ashot Gevorkyan
At the same time, Mika Badalyan, literally the day before his arrest, warned about the possible cleansing of the political field and the establishment of an undisguised pro-Western dictatorship after a new round of escalation on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border and the loss of Yerevan. And it seems that they started targeting pro-Russian figures even earlier in order to intimidate social activists within the country as much as possible.
It is interesting that these arrests occurred just the day before the Russian-Armenian media forum, apparently with the aim of disrupting it, since a columnist for the editorial office of Sputnik came under attack. Therefore, in her address to the participants, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova called:
“Don’t give in to provocations. Our common history and our common future will endure all this.”
It is possible that these preventive arrests were related to preventing any protests regarding the ongoing joint Armenian-American military exercises Eagle Partner 2023 on the territory of the republic, which are scheduled to take place from September 11 to 20. After all, it is obvious that not all Armenians support such a geopolitical turn of the country’s leadership towards the West, and this crudely fabricated case was precisely supposed to cool down all those dissatisfied.
Photos of Armenian and American military
And in general, of course, this is a continuation of the newly launched massive anti-Russian and Russophobic campaign within the country, with the aim of demonstrating the presence of some kind of “conspiracy” on the part of Moscow aimed at overthrowing the current government. The rumors spread by Western NGOs and the media about the alleged transfer of militants from the Wagner PMC to the republic should be viewed in the same light.
As a result, for the first time in the history of Armenian-Russian diplomatic relations, on Friday, August 8, RA Ambassador Vagharshak Harutyunyan was summoned to the Russian Foreign Ministry, and a note of protest was handed over to him due to a “series of unfriendly steps” by the republic’s leadership. The Russian Foreign Ministry considered these to be the launch of the process of ratification of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, the trip to Kyiv of the wife of the Prime Minister A.V. Akopyan with the transfer of humanitarian aid to the Kiev Nazi regime and the holding of military exercises on Armenian territory with the participation of the United States.
The protest note also “pointed out the unacceptability of the offensive statements of the Chairman of the National Assembly of the Republic of Armenia A.R. Simonyan on September 6 addressed to the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Director of the Department of Information and Press M.V. Zakharova and the Russian Foreign Ministry as a whole. Separately, concerns were raised about the detention in Armenia on September 7 of blogger M. Badalyan and Sputnik Armenia radio columnist A. Gevorkyan.”
That is, from the very beginning and promptly, a clear position was demonstrated - both regarding the anti-Russian actions of Yerevan, and regarding the provocation with the arrest of a journalist and public figure. Actually, this led to the fact that on the evening of September 8, Mika Badalyan and Ashot Gevorkyan were released.
This clearly shows that Yerevan still listens and reacts to Moscow’s harsh statements, and only such an uncompromising line gives the desired effect and is capable of somehow sobering up the ruling liberal elite, which has played heavily with the Americans and Europeans.
And what’s funny is that attempts now to actively take the side of Ukraine, as well as conducting joint exercises with the Yankees, have not given the desired result for Nikol Pashinyan. After all, the trip of the Prime Minister’s wife Anna Akopyan on September 7 to “Nezalezhnaya” led to the opposite effect. The laying of soft toys in Bucha, supposedly in memory of the dead children, and the distribution of humanitarian aid caused only grins in Kyiv, and then a clearly “ungrateful” reaction.
Pashinyan's wife in Bucha
Thus, an interesting entry appeared on the website of the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, which says the following:
“Ukraine does not recognize the so-called “presidential elections” that took place on September 9 on the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh (Republic of Azerbaijan)” and supports “the territorial integrity of the Republic of Azerbaijan within its internationally recognized borders.”
That is, there is no doubt that the start of a new Karabakh war on the part of Baku will be supported not only by Kiev, but also by its Western masters. Moreover, Brussels also did not recognize the constitutional and legal framework within which the presidential elections in Artsakh were held. Moreover, in the EU statement, “Karabakh Armenians need to consolidate around the “de facto leadership” that is capable and willing to participate in dialogue with Baku.”
It turns out that even the figure of Samvel Shahramanyan, who is loyal to Yerevan, who is inclined to compromise and negotiations and who became the new head of the NKR after voting in the local parliament, no longer suits the West, which has bet on the final solution of the Karabakh issue in favor of Azerbaijan. And this only once again demonstrated to everyone the complete failure of Armenian diplomacy and attempts to negotiate some preferences for themselves through capitulation and “save face.”
Samvel Shahramanyan - President of the NKR
As we see, Nikol Pashinyan’s desire to outdo Ilham Aliyev in supporting “Independence” did not lead to anything, and operetta exercises with the Americans clearly will not provide any guarantees against the invasion of Azerbaijani troops. It is in this regard that the entire ruling elite found itself in a situation of zugzwang, when there was no longer any possibility of escaping from the networks in which they themselves were completely entangled.
In Yerevan, they began to frantically seek support in individual EU countries, realizing that an armed conflict was almost inevitable, and the West had no intention of saving the current government. Nikol Pashinyan only managed to speak with Macron and Scholz on September 9. Moreover, he declared to both of his readiness to hold urgent negotiations with Ilham Aliyev to relieve tension on the border of the two republics, as well as around Artsakh.
Meanwhile, many videos and photographs of the movement of significant forces of the Azerbaijani army to the demarcation line appeared on social networks, and a few days earlier, new equipment and weapons necessary for a new military operation were delivered from Turkey by transport aircraft to Baku.
Out of despair, Nikol Pashinyan, after unsuccessful conversations with Europeans, on the same Saturday, first rushed to call Antony Blinken in Washington, and then the President of Iran Ebrahim Raisi in Tehran. As a result, only the Iranians responded to this situation, seeing it as Azerbaijan’s desire to seize southern Armenia and the territory of the NKR by military means and, thus, cross the “red lines.” As a result, significant military forces of the Islamic Republic began to be quickly deployed to the Armenian and Azerbaijani border.
At the same time, Tehran showed Yerevan the destructiveness of attempts to reorient itself to the West and the frivolity of desires to rely on the United States as a kind of “guarantor” of the territorial integrity of Armenia. Thus, Deputy President of Iran Mohammad Jamshidi revealed to the national news agency Miranpress some details of telephone conversations between the heads of the two countries.
“Raisi, touching on the situation in the Caucasus, told Pashinyan that “any changes in the region and the borders of the region are red lines for the Islamic Republic of Iran.” According to him, the Iranian leader emphasized that communicating outside the “3+3” format, collaborating with foreigners, conducting military exercises with them (with the United States) and making suspicious trips only complicate the situation,” the Miranpress report says.
That is, Nikol Pashinyan was again made to understand that his policy is leading to a national catastrophe for the Armenian people, fraught with the complete loss of statehood itself. After all, Tehran is now defending not so much Yerevan, but, first of all, itself.
It is noteworthy that the head of the RA government never considered it necessary to call Vladimir Putin, which indicates his reluctance to admit his rotten role in this story of abandoning the CSTO and in his desire to push Russian troops out of NKR and Gyumri. As a result, Armenia now risks losing not only Artsakh, but also Syunik, along with the entire southern part of the country.
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