Do you remember when the then-Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, visited Armenia in September 2022? There was great enthusiasm in Armenian “pro-Western” circles: people believed that her visit would ensure our safety and that Aliyev would never dare to resort to force again. Although Pelosi expressed her support for Armenia, a year after her visit, Azerbaijan launched a new attack and effectively depopulated Artsakh. The United States did not prevent this scenario, simply because it lacked the tools to do so.
Now, a similar enthusiasm surrounds the upcoming visit of French President Emmanuel Macron, who is expected to participate in the September 21 celebrations and attend a solemn concert dedicated to the 100th anniversary of Aznavour. While the visit of a head of state from a friendly country is, of course, a positive event, it is naive—or simply a propaganda trick—to expect such visits to resolve any security issues for Armenia.
Let’s not forget that previous French presidents—Jacques Chirac in 2006, Nicolas Sarkozy in 2011, François Hollande in 2015, and even Emmanuel Macron in 2018—have all visited Armenia. While these visits certainly contributed to the development of Armenian-French relations, they had no bearing on Armenia’s security. In contrast, consider Prime Minister Robert Kocharyan’s visit to Paris in December 1997.
He was received by President Chirac, and, according to reports, he convinced the head of a co-chair country of the OSCE Minsk Group that the Artsakh issue could be resolved not through the proposed phased approach. Such actions are directly relevant to the security topic we are discussing.
Read also
For years, pro-Western propagandists in government circles have argued that figures like Biden, Blinken, Macron, Scholz, and Stoltenberg have “strictly warned” Aliyev, and therefore he would never dare take any further steps against Armenia. But first, the notion of a “strong warning” is an obvious exaggeration. Second, these “warnings” have not yielded any results. And third, it seems that the “boss” of these propagandists has now abandoned the idea of Western mediation.
The biggest problem of our time is that politicians—both in Armenia and elsewhere—can say anything without being held accountable for it.
Aram Abrahamyan
