Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary David Shahnazaryan, who 1992-1995 was the Ambassador on special assignments of the President of the Republic of Armenia, and in 1994-95 headed the State Department of National Security, during the “Aravot” program “Areresum” (“Confrontation”) expressed the opinion that Russian peacekeepers in Artsakh have been performing two functions since the very first day.
“The first is to do everything to integrate the population of Nagorno- Karabakh, or as they say, the population of Karabakh, into Azerbaijan; they officially announced this, and not to create any obstacles for the Azerbaijani troops because everything that has been done in Artsakh since these recent events, they are joint Russian-Azerbaijani actions.”
Meanwhile, Artsakh (in particular, Hakob Hakobyan, co-founder of the “Ardarutyun” party, in an interview with “168 Hour”) says that it is necessary to draw the attention of the international community to the fact that the government of Azerbaijan is carrying out actions contrary to internationally accepted laws, “and not to allow, that the West should present that the Russian peacekeepers are unable to do anything about this problem. There is an impression that many of the same international structures are discrediting Russian peacekeepers’ activities rather than eliminating the real problems. David Shahnazaryan disagreed with that assessment.
“Firstly, Russia has an obligation there, according to the November 9, 2020 document, none of which has been fulfilled by Russia. Russia is a mediator there, isn’t it, as they say? But in this case, the mediator is not a signatory or notary but has certain obligations. Russia has abandoned all its obligations. The authorities of Artsakh should, first of all, present a demand to Russia.”
Read also
There is a counterargument that if the authorities of Armenia have already accepted that the territory of Artsakh is the territory of Azerbaijan, no other country can protect the interests of Armenians more. And the situation worsened when the Armenian authorities agreed that Artsakh is also a part of the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan. In response to this observation, Mr. Shahnazaryan reminded: “In 2018, I announced that this government came to hand over Artsakh; they have that problem.”
He added, “But neither Russia, nor the government of Armenia, nor Azerbaijan will manage to close the issue of the Nagorno- Karabakh conflict in any way. It exists and is being. It is difficult to call the behavior of Artsakh authorities adequate. They should understand very clearly that Russian peacekeepers are not and cannot be a guarantee of security for them.”
David Shahnazaryan also referred to the statement of the President of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, in which he declared “the opening of the Zangezur Corridor” as one of the conditions for the peace agreement. “That peace is simply impossible is a fact. And the philosophy of this government is simply nonsense: They announced that Armenia’s security system is in crisis. After saying this, the leader of any country should either commit suicide or at least resign. I will say more: it is not in a crisis; it is in a disaster. Our security is peace. Without being ready for war, there can be no peace. There were many publications on this topic that we will sign the documents and live in peace. There is no peaceful life for us in this region. We should always be in a struggle; I’m not saying in a war. We cannot even survive here without struggle. The battle here is very long, if not eternal.
David Shahnazaryan is sure “The fact that Moscow has completely exhausted its opportunities to act as a mediator is already obvious. I hope these authorities have already understood this, and Baku has also understood that because nothing is being done. Moscow has chosen a very biased position from the beginning. Years ago, many Russian analysts put forward such a formula (this especially started when Russia sold 5 billion worth of weapons to Azerbaijan), saying that Moscow cannot choose between Armenia and Azerbaijan because if it chooses, it will lose both. Moscow made that choice a long time ago.”
He agreed with the assumption that Azerbaijan was chosen, “Of course, they don’t hide it anymore.” And referring to what is happening in Russia now, he drew a historical parallel that whenever there were upheavals in Russia, they left our region, in 1918 and, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, “I told Russian officials 6-7 months ago, if you go for the 3rd time, you will not come here…
This Russian-Turkish tandem, which acts against us, will collapse sooner or later. Our whole task should be to destroy this tandem in every possible way because, in this case, it is obvious what losses we are going to. Especially since what is happening now with Artsakh, its participants are Baku, Moscow, and the official Yerevan. Regarding the observation of the former Prime Minister of Armenia, Hrant Bagratyan, that “we lightly attack the Russians, having received nothing from the West. At the same time, we cannot attack the West without receiving anything from the Russians,” David Shahnazaryan stated: “The West does not owe us anything. Russia has security agreements with us, not to mention the CSTO, and it has refused all that. And what the West does, even if it is in its own interests, is mainly in our interests.”
To the question: what are they doing, apart from statements and appeals, but there are no practical steps, and there are no sanctions against Azerbaijan? “If both Armenia and Artsakh are completely under the influence of Russia, they are not obliged to do so.”
The entire conversation is in the video.
Anna ISRAYELYAN
