Yesterday the only person, who made a speech at the 30th Assembly of the ARF was the representative of the ARF Bureau Hrant Margaryan, whose speech can be conditionally named as “Robert Kocharyan’s response to Levon Ter-Petrosyan.”
This time again ARF proved that it has inseparable ties with Robert Kocharyan. Thus Margaryan, who represents the Diaspora, blamed Levon Ter-Petrosyan of all the mishaps in the country. In the background of Ter-Petrosyan he sees the “ears of the ANM” and foreign forces, who wished to conquer the “fort from inside.” Before speaking about that let us mention that RA President Serzh Sargsyan also sent his message to the ARF Bureau and Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan personally participated in it and read his text. “Today our country is facing serious challenges, and we must unite our efforts to overcome them. We must modernize the political domain and economy, restore social solidarity and the international reputation of the Republic of Armenia, develop Motherland-Diaspora relations, and achieve the peaceful settlement of Artsakh conflict. The solution of the before mentioned issues require consistent and joint work. Our main political powers must attach importance to our national interests. I strongly believe that together with our trustworthy partner Armenian Revolutionary Dashnaktsutyun Party we will manage to build a more democratic, defended and strong state,” President Serzh Sargsyan underscored in his message addressed to ARF General Meeting. According to the ARF representative, who believes that “good” elections were held and “abrupt development” is expected, Dashnaktsoutyun has been an alternative both to the opposition and the authorities during the past 10 years. “Although in 1998-2008 we collaborated with the authorities and managed, to a certain extent, have our participation in the progress as well as the extremely important process developing the national policy, we also expressed our disagreements. We didn’t agree to the economic policy, we were dissatisfied with the fact that the country didn’t organize a coordinated struggle against corruption; we considered the illegal demeanor of the privileged group and criminal and half-criminal elements intolerable. We considered that all this moved the country towards autocracy or instability. By participating in the presidential race, we were putting an end to our previous cooperation with the authorities and somehow, creating a possibility of a new beginning for us. We didn’t have the right to act as timeservers at the last moment, by quitting our former partners.” In the estimation of Hrant Margaryan, the last four presidential elections were held in an extremely tense atmosphere. There were bloody clashes twice – in 1998 and in 2008. Is it by mere accident that in both cases the chief player and participant was the same person, acting as a representative of the authorities in he former case and as a pro-opposition figure in the latter? “After ten years of silence, there appeared a person on the political arena whom society remembers with hatred. The policy course he pursued in our country suffered a crushing defeat. Realizing this perfectly well, the former leader returned to the Armenian Pan-National Movement, his organization, thus hiding his supporters, all his programs and, after all, his personality behind the dissatisfaction existing in the country. It turned out that leading a program-based ideological struggle was not his objective,” the representative of the ARFD bureau mentioned. At last it was the turn of Hrant Margaryan’s main report the reason of which was that the past and present governments clashed in the presidential election, both avoided ideological, policy struggle, Levon Ter-Petrosyan followed a foreign plot of a color revolution, the opposition was ready for March 1, it favored the opposition only, the government was not ready for March 1 and it should be found out why. Apart from all this, Hrant Margaryan said the percentage which was written opposite the name of their presidential candidate Vahan Hovhanisyan did not correspond to the real rating of Vahan Hovhanisyan. Generally, Hrant Margaryan described Serge Sargsyan’s victory as “not clean”. At the same time, Hrant Margaryan stated that since the state and national security were endangered, the ARF Dashnaktsutyun could not keep aloof, therefore, for the sake of the state, it joined in a coalition with the government about which it did not accept a lot of things, which according to Hrant Margaryan, underwent powerful international tension from the very beginning. “Now the external tension is gathering momentum, they have shaped a force or a network inside to capture the citadel from the inside. We are implementing a program of weakening the state. In this situation, we have no other way. We were supposed to back our statehood. We should display our will, our resolve to solve out internal issues ourselves, restore unity. And at that moment we signed a political agreement with the president elect who had not been inaugurated yet,” Margaryan says. According to him, the stay of the ARF Dashnaktsutyun in the coalition is understood as long as the danger persists. “However, the duration of the coalition is determined by clear tasks, and from time to time we are going to assess the results of the cooperation. The coalition is not an end in itself for the ARF Dashnaktsutyun,” Margaryan stated. At the same time, he says the result of the past short period is positive, and there is hope and expectations. “We want to believe that the priorities which we declared will be brought into being. With full responsibility did we assume the load, we expect the same from our partners.” “The opposition was ready for the March 1 events while the authorities were not,” ARF Bureau representative Hrant Margaryan said today at the 30th Congress of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation. “The reasons for the authorities’ unwillingness are still to be revealed,” he says. “Obviously, the clash was favorable for outer forces and for people who dislike their homeland and people. The clash weakened the country and opened a way for an outside intervention. Moreover, the clash endangered the country’s reputation, security and self-confidence to protect national interests on an international level. We couldn’t sit around twiddling our thumbs during the events.” And to save the country the ARF entered into the coalition memorandum. Hrant Margaryan says that the tension of the pre-election period resulted in mutual hostility and the conflicting sides began defaming each other through all possible methods. “The tense atmosphere worsened and polarized still more. The former and acting authorities fought a ceaseless struggle during the election. Those who complained of the former leadership voted for the acting ones and the vice versa. They helped each other securing votes and threatening innocent people,” says Margaryan. He compared the March 1 occurrences with those of September 1996. They were both accompanied by bloody clashes. The key actor in both cases was the same person-in the first case as a president while in the second as an oppositionist. I don’t want to bind you with my opinion. But one thing is evident-all elections are conducted in a tense and polarized atmosphere. “We descended on the arena as an alternative force to the authorities and the opposition.” Margaryan spoke of an unspecified world power that “seeks to subordinate the causes of all peoples to its interests and aims” by means of “various international NGOs and foundations.” He was asked which states exactly helped Levon Ter-Petrosyan if Hrant Margaryan voiced confidence in his speech that Levon Ter-Petrosyan acted in accordance with an external plot of a color revolution, like in Georgia, Ukraine, Serbia. Hrant Margaryan said he did not mean states but international organizations. As to which is the way of relieving tension, Hrant Margaryan says: “Dialogue. Rely on us and sit down to talk. If you rely on others, you play another game,” Hrant Margaryan says. In this connection, the reporters asked him about his thoughts on Serge Sargsyan who thanked Putin for supporting in the election. “Is it not a case of relying on others?” the reporters asked. “The states should comply with civilized and ethical rules in dealing with one another. We consider all the non-Armenian forces as alien,” Hrant Margaryan says, noting that the state thanked the state. “There is a difference,” Hrant Margaryan says. Asked which concrete foreign government is keen to foment a “color revolution” in Armenia, he said, “It’s not hard guess. I think you know it.” “The network was formed by the foreign power,” Margaryan said in his speech. “The opposition presidential candidate as placed and dressed on the network.” The Iranian-born politician, who spent more than three years in prison during Ter-Petrosyan’s rule, further charged that the former Armenian president is primarily responsible for the March 1 clashes in Yerevan between riot police and his supporters, which left at least ten people dead. “March 1 was beneficial for neither the country, nor for the people or the government,” he said. “It was beneficial only for him and unfortunately he got it. Those who still believe him must think about that. Especially the youth.” Margaryan echoed the Armenian government’s justification of the bloody suppression of the post-election opposition protests. “If I was attacked I too would use firearms too,” he told reporters. “Who would want his head to be chopped?” Addressing the party conference, Margaryan also commented on his party’s poor showing in the presidential election. According to the Central Election Commission, the Dashnaktsutyun candidate, Vahan Hovhanisyan, won only 6 percent of the vote. During the election campaign Hovhanisyan urged Armenians to reject their current and former leaders, saying that they are both to blame for the country’s problems. Margaryan blamed Hovhanisyan’s failure to live up to the party’s expectations on the government camp and Ter-Petrosyan. “Fear of other candidates’ success was the reason why our candidate’s performance did not match his real popularity,” he said. The Dashnaktsutyun leader was particularly scathing about Ter-Petrosyan’s harsh anti-government rhetoric that earned the ex-president unexpectedly strong voter support. “He didn’t come to wage a program-based and ideological struggle,” said Margaryan. “Rallying the headless opposition masses around him, he created an atmosphere in which ethical norms of struggle gave way to destruction, slander, hatred and demagoguery.” Margaryan went on to defend Dashnaktsutyun’s decision to remain part of a government which it strongly criticized during the election campaign. He cited the need to help the Sargsyan administration cope with external challenges facing Armenia. “As long as that danger is there, our being in the coalition is justified,” he said. “The anti-Karabakhtsi movement is an anti-national movement. We should realize that we are one nation, we all should be Karabakhtsi, Javakhktsi, Nakhijevantsi. The artificial separations lead us to divisions. We remember the days when dozens of newspapers were banned, when a party was banned, when politicians were behind the bars and not on squares and when corruption, impunity, injustice were as spread as now. As hard as we try to hide the Armenian National Movement, change the name, we see the ANM’s ears. The winning side was on the other pole. It did not win the election fairly but neither we, nor the international community have disputed the results. The current authorities are the successor of the ones in power for the past ten years but we should not consider them as completely the same. It was clear that the government was under huge pressure from outside. The outside pressure has increased today: they have set up a force – a network – inside the country to seize the fortress from inside. We had no choice in this situation, we had to stand by our statehood, we had to show we can solve our problems on our own. And we signed a political agreement with the president-elect. Our presence in the coalition is understandable as long as the threat exists. But the endurance of the coalition is a condition for the clear goals, and we will evaluate the results once in a while. There are positive steps and there are hope and expectations. The Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly has put forward demands for our country, and many are happy. But the truth is that before Resolution 1609, the coalition parties had assumed the same goals. Why are they not glad about the coalition agreement that we will implement regardless of Europe? Also, what the coalition has agreed to accomplish is in line with the Dashnaktsutyun goals and principles. What were we supposed to do? Some think we should have not jointed the ruling coalition and become opposition. Is this a responsible political position? No, and no again,” said Margaryan.