Yesterday for the first time the Armenian-Turkish protocols were formally discussed in the National Assembly. Indeed, during yesterday’s session of the Foreign Relations Committee of the NA they have discussed not the contents of the protocols but the procedures of the discussion of the protocols.
Urgent issue
Before the launch of the discussion of the procedures of the discussion, during the session the head of the NA secretariat Tatoul Soghomonyan entered to the room. At that time the head of the committee Armen Rustamyan said that the government has submitted to urgent discussion of the NA the draft amendments to Armenia’s Law ‘On International Treaties’ and that this draft should be discussed in the urgent session of the NA as well. They went to break immediately after that. The deputy-minister of foreign affairs Shavarsh Kocharyan arrived to present the draft. This draft also related to the protocols. Let us remember that approximately two months ago the president of Armenia Serzh Sargsyan announced that he has assigned the relevant bodies of Armenia to prepare amendments to the law on international treaties. “This is evidence that the assignment of the president is being abided,” said Kocharyan. “If these were not the well-known protocols perhaps so much attention would not be drawn to this law and the omissions that exist there,” added Rustamyan. According to this initiative the RA President, Prime Minister and the Foreign Affairs Minister will acquire the power to call back or annul international treaties by only informing the second party of that. “I want to clarify to avoid creating the impression that the meaning of the changes is that there is a decision that we should quickly quit the process,” Kocharyan explained. “The Armenian side sincerely seeks to implement the protocols. On the other hand, we will never tolerate this whole process being used for advancing preconditions,” he warned. The head of the foreign relations committee, meanwhile, has formally requested the speaker not to bring up the protocols for discussion until the parliament receives his committee’s conclusions. Armen Rustamyan, a senior lawmaker from the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun), one of the key critics of the protocols, said Hovik Abrahamyan has not yet provided a clear response to the request. During preliminary discussions of the protocols on Friday the key parliamentary committee dominated by pro-government lawmakers decided to set up a five-member group to work out, within a week, a procedure in which the protocols will be discussed by the body. Rustamyan complained of the circumstance that only the President and the Executive branch bodies can have the power to annul the treaties. He suggested that the An should also have the power to do so. “The Parliament has a better power to ratify or not ratify,” opposed Kocharyan. This draft has deserved quite tense discussions in the session of the committee. Is this an alarm to deflect from the process of normalization of Turkish-Armenian relations? If the law on international treaties has so many omissions why have they decided to amend the part that relates to cancellation and annulment of treaties and agreements? These questions were asked by the head of the Heritage faction Stepan Safaryan. The MP also added that this draft creates an opportunity to cancel the protocols they are against that. In his words, besides this flaw there are many others in the law. “This law has a purpose so that we’d allow our country to have tools by which to protect our state interests. And we should maximally enlarge the arsenal of these tools. But are we doing the necessary changes coming from the current situation. I think that this is not complete and for that we have our package of recommendations,” Rustamyan said. Armen Rustamyan also said that “as things stand now” the foreign relations committee dominated by pro-government lawmakers, including representatives of the Republican Party, is likely to provide a positive conclusion on the protocols. Rustamyan, though, contended that his arguments as well as those of another opposition party’s committee member “cannot fail to have some impact on the discussion.” “This is a matter of crucial importance, and therefore the sessions could last for several days,” said Rustamyan, adding that after the completion of preliminary discussions a separate meeting will be appointed for the committee to reach its conclusion. “This law should allow us deflecting from the protocols any time we feel the need,” concluded Rustamyan. As a result, the committee indeed gave a positive evaluation to the initiative pf the government to include this issue in the agenda of the NA session. And the former chairman of the NA Tigran Torosyan assumes that this draft is a tool to pressure on the Turkish side to ratify the process. “But I am more than sure that this pressure is not going to affect Turkey at all. Moreover, I think that there was even no need to submit such a draft because if the protocols are not ratified the parties can any time cancel those and deflect from the process. By this everything will be over. In these cases it is better to have a clear vision and position rather than take unclear strides. They could have brought the protocols to the National Assembly and let the MPs vote based on their conscience and convictions. The RA government thinks that if an agreement is signed it should be ratified by all means. Indeed it is not so. There are many countries that don’t ratify the agreements after signing those,” says Torosyan.
The protocols will not be signed yet
Last Friday Serzh Sargsyan sent the protocols to the NA. And these were mechanically included not only in the big session of the NA but also in the 4-day session to be launched on Monday. According to the law on international treaties this type of treaties are immediately in the agendas of discussions. So the positive or negative evaluation of the foreign relations committee cannot have any influence on the process of discussion of the protocols. So according to the NA bylaw only the chairman of the National Assembly determines the terms and sequence of discussion of issues. But yesterday Armen Rustamyan suggested the NA chairman not to discuss the protocols until those are discussed within the NA foreign relations committee and Hovik Abrahamyan accepted this suggestion. And prior to that, Safaryan suggested that first parliamentary hearings are held on these documents and only after that submit those to the conclusion of the committee. Rustamyan wasn’t against this but left this issue to the decision of the political parties of the parliament. In his words on Monday the 5 NA parliamentary factions will present their attitudes to the head of the commission. Besides that it was decided to create a special working group consisting of a representative from each of the 5 factions. The working group will discuss the procedures of the discussion of the protocols in the NA. So the 5 members are Armen Rustamyan, Stepan Safaryan, Ernest Soghomonyan from the Prosperous Armenia, Hamlet Harutyunyan from the RPA and Seryozha Abrahamyan from the Legal State. There is an opinion that the protocols should be discussed in all the 12 committees of the NA so that the latter would bring up their recommendations.