The so-called “tomato” protest organized by the Youth Organization of the Republican Party of Armenia (RPA) concerning murderer Ramil Safarov’s return to Azerbaijan and amnesty has been criticized a lot. It is discussed also on social networks. In particular, a few days ago, Lilit Galstyan, a member of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (ARF), expressed an opinion on her Facebook page, “There are more serious steps in the diplomatic arsenal than throwing tomatoes and shoes and burning flags.” www.aravot.am asked during a conversation with Karen Avagyan, the head of the Youth Organization of the RPA and a National Assembly member, to comment on the criticism of them. In response to all critics, K. Avagyan said the following, “Have they done anything better so far?” The National Assembly member calls on all those people, “If you cannot help, don’t impede.”
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Then K. Avagyan stressed, “Our organization has urged many times to act jointly, united in such cases and to express our protest to the great powers and international organizations, from which we expect a concrete response, concrete actions and positions, as strongly and loudly as possible. Thanks to all those who support our projects and actions. We are ready to join all the present, past and future actions that will make our youth’s opinion stronger and make the youth’s voice louder.”
In response to the critics, K. Avagyan also stated, “Our response, by which we were able to grab the international community’s attention and to express our protest, was that ‘tomato’ protest. I am sorry, but I don’t care who makes what comments and what assessments, since we have fulfilled our task, we have managed to voice our protest, which was actually organized 40 minutes after the information was spread. Perhaps they feel bad that we responded so quickly and they didn’t manage to take any action. In any case, it is their problem.”
As for the article on burning the Hungarian flag spread in the mass media yesterday suggesting that the flag had been burned by the RPA youths, the National Assembly member said, “I assure you that no flag was burned on that day, during that protest. We ourselves prevented the burning of the flag.”
Tatev HARUTYUNYAN
