What message did the government representative send to Russia?
The representatives of the forces taking the initiative to withdraw from the CSTO left satisfied. A few days ago, the Chairman of the NA Defense and Security Affairs Committee Andranik Kocharyan had a closed meeting in his NA office with representatives of political forces and NGOs demanding to leave the CSTO. This meeting is already being presented in the mass media like this: a group of “anti-Russian” people from the Civil Contract were received in the office. As we found out, at that meeting they discussed not only the risks and opportunities of leaving the CSTO, but also the problems of the police and the army in general.
Aravot spoke with several figures who participated in the meeting to find out how Andranik Kocharyan responded to their demand, what promises he made, and to what extent the meeting yielded results. Azat Arshakyan, former deputy of the Supreme Council of the Republic of Armenia, said, “We presented our arguments in favor of leaving the CSTO, we said: announce it right now, call a meeting, or let the executive simply announce that it is suspending its membership in that organization.”
Azat Arshakyan conveyed that he said that the CSTO is just a sign for us with “dog” written on it and that we don’t need it. “In general, CSTO is a preventive factor against war, border tensions, and threats. We show that sign, we say: look, we have a dog, it will bite you and bark at you, but it turns out that our dog neither knows how to bark nor bite. That’s why you need to give up that dog.
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Andranik Kocharyan carefully listened to our arguments and said: there is a slight difference between us: you have the right to free speech, and we are a little more constrained, we are responsible for the security of Armenia in general. He diplomatically said that we are doing everything to make Armenia a safe country. He listened to us carefully and we appreciated that.”
We clarified: that is, Andranik Kocharyan agreed with you, but as part of the government, he has no right to speak out. He is constrained. Arshakyan answered, “Yes, of course. We accepted the basis, we said: look, you also announce that the CSTO is useless, idle, etc., and we say: since you know this, the behavior of the government and some members of the National Assembly is encouraging, but we also hope that you will hear the opinion of the public. He himself said what is possible and as far as you know, we have already done it, the rest will show later.”
Azat Arshakyan answered the question about if he gave any promise that we will leave CSTO.
“He made a comparison. He said: you are in a car, but the steering wheel and brakes are in the hands of the government. Now if you remove the brakes and the steering wheel, the government is responsible for the safe movement of that vehicle, so don’t force it and don’t rush us.” As for the reaction of the mass media that the anti-Russian forces went to the meeting in the National Assembly, Azat Arshakyan said, “We know where it comes from, but what are the anti-Armenian forces doing?
I am already getting stronger in my opinion. How correctly I assessed them. Those anti-Armenian organizations- the EAEU, Customs Union, CSTO, USSR- all of them are anti-Armenian organizations. They are rebelling and protesting because our voice is being heard, so it is necessary to fight.”
Hripsime JEBEJYAN
