The announcement of the four-way meeting in Granada defines what happened in Karabakh as mass displacement. Neither the USA nor the Russian Federation currently recognize that what happened in Artsakh is ethnic cleansing and genocide, US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said. “Allegations of genocide or ethnic cleansing must be based on a clear, evidence-based process. I can’t talk about it until it’s final.” The information leaflet of the Russian Foreign Ministry says: “We assist those who voluntarily left the region, as well as to those residents who decided to stay.”
When asked why the international community does not want to call the incident by its name, Avet Adonts, coordinator of the “Araratian Alliance” Institute, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary, hosted on “Aravot” “Areresum” program, said: “The roots are from the day when the readiness to recognize the territorial integrity of Azerbaijan, including Artsakh, was announced from the highest podium of the Republic of Armenia, and that is the NA podium, after that the position in this or that country or international organization towards Artsakh and that agenda changed drastically.” He reminded that even after the attack of Azerbaijan, a response manipulated by the enemy was heard in the UN, that “there is no direct threat to the civilian population of Nagorno-Karabakh.” “What will others do in our place?”
“Unfortunately, today, Armenia does not have the strength and the diplomatic intelligence to make the most of the current geopolitical situation for the benefit of Armenia or for Armenia to have a place in the processes taking place in our region today,” assessed Avet Adonts, who, let’s remind, was in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs from 1992 to 2021 having worked at various times as the RA Ambassador to Belgium, Head of the RA Representation in the European Union, RA Ambassador to Spain, RA Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, etc. “We have become a platform where the West and the East settle scores with each other.”
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He also referred to the ratification of the Statute of the International Criminal Court, the Rome Statute, by Armenia. “Considering the regional geopolitical situation and the risks coming from Turkey and Azerbaijan, which we face daily, common sense should dictate that we work toward risk reduction.
What are we doing? We increase those risks even more. In other words, it is clear that the ratification of the Rome Statute, no matter how much the National Assembly or the government representatives, justify and try to explain that it has no anti-Russian orientation, they know very well that it will not pass. Due to the Rome Statute, Russian representatives cannot visit many countries. Well, those visits aside. However, we are carrying out a very pronounced, for the West, “oily” anti-Russian step, which the West welcomes. During the last 1-1.5 years, it was the first statement of the President of the European Commission, the German Mrs. von der Leyen , about Armenia and the region. Until then, the tragedies that happened, the war or the issue of sovereignty, that a part of Armenia’s territory is occupied, are silent about it. Still, the fact that Armenia ratified the Rome Statute was welcomed at once.
That’s why I say Europe and Russia are settling accounts with each other here. We should not allow this; it is only and only to our detriment. The first practical example of this was the surrender of Karabakh and depopulation.”
Read excerpts from Arsen Gasparyan, the interlocutor of Avet Adonts, former chief adviser to the prime minister, doctor of political sciences, and President of the “Ex Oriente” Union of Orientalists of Armenia, here.
The entire conversation is in the video.
Anna ISRAYELYAN
