Ashot Grigorian, an Armenian physicist, entrepreneur, philanthropist and activist living in Slovakia since 1993, is one of the leading representatives of the Armenian community. The president of the Forum of Armenian Unions of Europe is a very unique personality. The headquarters of his business empire confirms a lot. No one could expect what could be hidden in that building located in the center of Bratislava’s industrial area. The headquarters of his company is a building made of glass and marble, on top of the latter you can view his world. It is a huge space under a glass dome, like a tropical garden, full of exotic flora, fountains and various animals.
For this impoverished country of three million people, which has gone through severe trials, and finds itself in the neighborhood of deadly enemies and countries much stronger than itself, people like him are extremely important.
Perhaps that strange story, which he told me over a glass of excellent Armenian cognac and the chirping of parrots flying around his kingdom, best describes the situation in the country.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Armenia found itself in a serious dispute with neighboring Azerbaijan over the Nagorno Karabakh issue. The country had almost no air force, and it was necessary to urgently acquire several military planes, which, however, was impossible, because the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) did not allow the sale of weapons to the parties of hot war conflicts. (Of course, Ukraine is entirely something else…)
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But Grigorian found a solution. He bought decommissioned Russian SU25 fighter jets cheaply with his own money, cut the wings up for transportation, loaded the whole thing on a train and shipped it to Armenia, declaring it as scrap metal in the customs papers. *2
Then the wings were mounted on the fuselages of the planes, something was repaired, painted, and here we are, the Air Force of Armenia was equipped with new planes. Grigorian proudly showed me a video where the President of Armenia personally thanked him in front of the entire nation for this patriotic act at the solemn military parade dedicated to the 20th anniversary of Independence.
In the early summer of 2020, Grigorian held a press conference in Bratislava where he accused the then foreign minister, Miroslav Lajčák, of allowing the large-scale black sale of Slovak arms to Azerbaijan. In 2017 and 2018, Lajčák ‘s ministry, in violation of international agreements, allowed Azerbaijan to sell 36 units of modern Dana M-1 self-propelled howitzers on the chassis of a Tatra truck and 30 units of RM-70 Vampír rocket launchers, which are actually terrible weapons of destruction.
The Israeli organization was presented as the buyer, but it was an intermediary, and it was clear that the weapons would go further. At the same time, we should note that the arms export license is issued by the Ministry of Economy, but the end user certificate, which is the most important in the case of arms export, must be issued by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It is the body that should know and check whether the weapons are not going to terrorists or not being exported through a false route: this is strictly unacceptable.The ministry headed by Lajčák undoubtedly knew very well what it was about. Even if it was theoretically possible that Lajčák did not know the end user (in this case, the name of Azerbaijan), at least he would have been informed when the plane of the Azerbaijani company Silk Way, which belongs to the family of the President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, started flying from Baku to Slovakia to receive the weapon (it is known that the company previously had close relations with the American Pentagon).
The transaction was carried out as follows: the plane arrived from Baku to Bratislava, after loading weapons there, flew to Tel Aviv, where it stayed for a few hours, and then flew to Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, with changed documents. Then it returned again to Slovakia and again to Tel Aviv and Baku and so 66 times from September 2017 to July 2018.
The thing is Lajčák and his people did not stop it. They didn’t even stop the deal when representatives of the Armenian communities started protesting. They did not stop even after the media started writing about it. From which high court was this fake deal sponsored? The weight of the criminality of the transaction becomes heavier if we also mention that the former Foreign Minister Lajčák was also the president of the 72nd session of the UN General Assembly, and then he was also appointed as the president of the OSCE. OSCE should manage and check such transactions, so that European states do not sell weapons to hotbeds of conflicts. Thus, this was the case when the Foreign Minister of Slovakia was responsible for the security activities of all relevant bodies of the European Union.It’s been a few months. In September, the Nagorno-Karabakh war began, and Grigorian again addressed the mass media and called a press conference. It was written in the press invitation: “Azerbaijan invaded Armenia using military equipment from Slovakia, which was supplied with the help of M. Lajčák’s fake license.” Also sitting with Grigorian were speakers former Slovak Prime Minister Ján Čarnogurský and former President of the National Council František Mikloško, people who in the past have greatly contributed to the friendship between Slovakia and Armenia.
Mr. Mikloško visited both Armenia and Karabakh twice during his high positions, for which the Prosecutor’s Office of Azerbaijan even announced an international search for his arrest through Interpol. Although he did not appear in Baku prison, in reality, however, the probability was very high.
Armenia and Nagorno Karabakh, as its historical part, are a very sensitive issue for Christians. The apostles Bartholomew and Thaddeus came to Armenia to spread the Christian faith, as a result of which this country was the first in the world to adopt Christianity as the state religion in 301. This is also the reason why the Armenian Apostolic Church is an autonomous church, because the apostles are behind the origin of Christianity and the roots of the Armenian Church come from the time of Christ. According to Mikloško, this ancient symbol of Christianity can perhaps be compared only with Rome or Jerusalem.
However, the history of the Armenian nation, situated between Turkish and Muslim countries, is tragic. As a result of the Armenian Genocide organized by the Turks at the end of 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, up to one and a half million Armenians died. Armenians were saved from complete annihilation by being included in the Soviet Union, where they were able to live peacefully for seventy years and have their union republic. However, Nagorno-Karabakh was administratively joined to Azerbaijan, which caused a dispute over this territory after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
And here once again a cultural genocide is taking place. Old Armenian cemeteries, monasteries and Christian monuments are being destroyed. Today, not even a trace of them remains.
Why does Azerbaijan want to own that mountainous and rocky area, if 95 percent of the population there are Armenians? And why is Turkey so involved in this conflict? These questions become understandable if we note that Azerbaijanis call themselves “Azeri Turks” and generalize with Turks, although this is not so close to reality.
“Sultan” Erdogan needs to capture a part of the Armenian territory in order to create a corridor through which Turkey will connect with other Turkic states east of the Caucasus. Its goal is to unite the Russian republics – Tatarstan, Bashkirstan, as well as the neighboring Central Asian countries – Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan.
A very promising ally is Kazakhstan, but the Chinese Muslim Uyghurs are following it,”- Grigorian says. The result was to be a great Turkic neo-Ottoman caliphate stretching from Vienna to Siberia and China.
After the second press release, we received a letter from Lajčák to the editorial office. He demanded an apology from him for the article we wrote, otherwise he would sue us. How was it really? In fact, we quoted Grigorian’s statement that “M. Lajčák gave a fake license”, so Lajčák was right. He himself did not actually issue a license to export arms. His ministry only issued an end-user certificate, that is, a permit that was required by the Ministry of Economy to issue a license.
For that one inaccuracy, we immediately apologized to Lajčák in a short article, and there was silence. Lajčák no longer objected to the serious claims made in the June-September article.
But Grigorian suddenly got angry.
“He committed such a serious crime and you are still apologizing to him,” he scolded me. –
Mr. Lajčák defends himself by stating that the opinion on the arms trade was given by the relevant department of the Ministry and he did not approve the arms trade, but it was approved by his respective department. It’s good that he didn’t try to put some of the blame on his driver.
Only the truth is the only one. The minister signs the license, and the minister dictates what the text should be, and the minister bears all responsibility for the license. We know it very well,” -Grigorian said angrily.
“It is surprising that when HS wrote about it, Mr. Lajčák demanded an apology from them. That is why we have now sent a letter to Mr. Lajčák, in which we write that everything written by the editor and published by HS is true, and if Mr. Lajčák does not apologize to that media for his behavior, then I Ashot Grigorians, I will apply to the court on this matter. I have already initiated one criminal case against Mr. Lajčák on charges of international fraud, and the scandal involving this man cannot be forgotten,” – Grigorian said.
However, Grigorian emphasized another interesting fact related to the violation of the arms embargo, which is a serious violation of the international obligations of the Slovak Republic. “It will be interesting to see how the Slovak court will deal with this issue now, as well as the cabinet of Prime Minister Matovič, who has long considered himself a fighter against corruption. Here is a great opportunity to solve the scandalous case of the international corruption scandal in an exemplary way. Especially since Lajčák is a representative of the “Smer” party, which is hated by Prime Minister Matovič,” Grigorian said at the time.
Many months and years have passed since then, and there is complete silence about this case. How is that possible? Some can give a logical explanation by pointing out that Lajčák and Matovič, as well as their junta, are subject to the same master, who is very comfortable with the defeat of Armenia, because it is also the defeat of Armenia’s only ally, Russia. (By the way, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov himself is half-Armenian from his father’s side).
With the loss of Armenia, Russia will completely lose its positions in the South Caucasus and the southern region. Such an idea, according to it, that the gentlemen across the ocean have appealed to their old friends in Slovakia, demanding some service. It is very tempting to help supply arms unofficially when it is already not officially possible.
What do you say, isn’t this a “conspiracy theory”?
