The presidential elections of February 19 2008 and the events, which succeeded it, will for a long time be a subject for discussion in the society. By considering the curfew and the restrictions, which the mass media means must follow (even after the moderation) we decided to refrain ourselves from comments and publication of inaccurate information. Below we are presenting to you some statements made during the last period from different sources. Now as we have what we have it is very interesting to look at things in the retrospect. On February 29 no one would think that we would have what we had in a few hours. Neither did the chief officer of the OSCE ODIHR monitoring mission Gert Arens, when he was saying, “I don’t have the right to give advice but we have noticed a certain thing. We have seen that people were really law-abiding in the square and I don’t think there were hooligans. And especially the young people are most interested in democratic elections. This is a movement, to which the RA government must be most responsible for. And I also think that the right treatment is needed for this movement,” concluded Arens (Liberty Radio, February 29). And after March 1 the reaction of international organizations were totally different. Let us mention a few. The OSCE chairman condemned the use of force in Armenia, “Today the chairman of the OSCE Ilka Canerva condemned the use of force in Yerevan.” “I encourage the government to show maximal moderateness. I am concerned about the information, according to which there are injured citizens. I encourage the government to release the prisoners and again call for the government to initiate a dialog between them and the opposition,” said the chairman of the OSCE (Liberty, March 1). “Secretary General of the Council of Europe Terry Davis made a statement, in which he expresses his concern about the situation in Armenia. I am extremely concerned about the fact that this morning the law-enforcing bodies of Armenia have applied force to disseminate the public in the square and thus used force against them. When this information is confirmed the actions must be carefully investigated. It is also very important to prevent any other attempt of use of force,” reads his statement (168 Zham newspaper, March 1). It is interesting that two days ago Terry Davis congratulated Serzh Sargsyan for his victory in elections and expressed a wish to meet him. On the next day the European Parliament made a strict statement about the post-electoral developments. We will speak about this statement again. But before that let us present a few statements made before that. “Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Matthew Bryza visited Armenia on March 7-8. In the course of his visit he met with President Kocaharyan, Prime Minister Serzh Sargsyan, Foreign Affairs Minister Vartan Oskanyan, former president Levon Ter-Petrosyan, other opposition political leaders, and members of civil society. Mr. Bryza appealed for calm on all sides and an end to violence. He told his interlocutors that the State of Emergency should end and that the best way to ease tensions is through dialogue between all parties. He noted that, to encourage dialogue, restrictions on the press should be lifted and full media freedom restored. Mr. Bryza also highlighted the need for the police and the courts to be scrupulous in their investigations of the events of March 1st and 2nd to avoid the appearance of persecution of political opponents. Bryza said that bilateral relations with the United States would depend on the speed with which the Armenian authorities establish a democratic institutional framework in Armenia. He stressed the eagerness of the Minsk Group Co-Chairs to finalize the Basic Principles for the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict settlement.” (US Embassy in Armenia, March 7). “Only the dialog and exclusion of further rapid steps can resolve the tense political situation of Armenia.” Such an opinion was made by the assistant to the State Secretary of the US, Curt Walker. “We don’t think that such methods are acceptable. It is necessary to cancel the curfew, provide freedom for the media and rallies, and provide normal functioning of parties and NGOs. That way it will be possible to have Armenia out of the political crisis,” stated Curt Walker (Radio Liberty). The PACE, OSCE, EU, UN, Council of Europe, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and other organizations also encouraged the government to start a dialog with the opposition. Foreign Affairs Ministries of a number of European states have also expressed their concerns about the situation in Armenia. During this period Armenia hosted the head of the PACE monitoring mission John Prescott, assistant to the US State Secretary Mathew Bryza, special official of the OSCE Heiki Talvitie. The requests and encouragement still continues. Specifically, according to the Radio Liberty two days ago the European Parliament in its full session adopted a resolution with 60 for, 1 against and 2 abstainers, according to which it challenges the government of Armenia to cancel the state of emergency. The MPs of the European Parliament mention, “The pressure and actions applied by the RA police against the peaceful protesters of the presidential elections caused 8 cases of death and dozens of injured. On March 1 the President of RA signed a decree about the state of emergency and thus the freedom of media in the country was limited.” “The MPs of the European Parliament request the RA government to conduct an impartial and open investigation of the incidents of March 1. The culprits must be strictly punished by the court,” reads the resolution. The RA Prosecutor General’s Office on its part gave its consent to conduct an international expertise of the incidents in the country. The EU also requested the RA government to cancel the curfew in the country, “The presidency of the EU expressed its concern about the situation of Armenia and encouraged the government to cancel the curfew.” “The EU is especially concerned about the continuous cases of arrest,” reads the statement. In the meantime the EU welcomed the steps of the government to loosen the tight control on media. “The EU once again encourages the RA government to release the citizens, who are under custody at present because of the expression of their political will and restrain themselves from further attempts of arresting people,” implies the statement. “The EU confirmed its suggestion to conduct an independent investigation to reveal the reasons of incidents of March 1” (Liberty, March 14). As of the attitude of the US then during the interview to the Liberty the US Embassy Charge d’Affaires in Armenia Joseph Pennington said, “We have clearly delivered our attitude to the RA government, according to which although we recognize the fact that there were obvious hooligans during March 1-2 demonstrations, however the government must differentiate the actual criminals from the ones, who contradict the attitude of the government. People, who were arrested because of their political attitude, may be considered as political detainees. We don’t welcome that and think that this process will even more deepen the instability in the country.” Pennington also expressed his concern that his meetings were not broadcast, “I think that certain statements were cut from the general context and didn’t reflect what actually Bryza tried to say. Mr. Bryza clearly told the RA government that the state of emergency must be cancelled in the country.” Moreover, as it seems the Americans have defined concrete “sanctions” for Armenia. The first of that is of course the “freezing” of the MCC compact. “During the discussion of the 2009 US Budget regarding the US funding the US State Secretary Condoleezza Rice stated that the MCC Compact of Armenia is in danger. She stated that the recent events in Armenia made the US government revise its funding. She also informed that it’s worth warning the Armenians that the curfew also jeopardizes the MCC program” (infoarmenia.org). The executive director of the MCC John Danilovich also spoke about this in his letter addressed to the RA President Robert Kocharyan. “The MCC has the right to freeze and cancel the agreement signed with Armenia in the event of a serious political regress and the letter is an official warning that the recent events have negatively affected the MCC funding to Armenia” (Radio Liberty). In this background nothing can be understood from the intention of both the opposition and the government about the dialog between them. Specifically, Serzh Sargsyan has stated several times that he is willing to start the dialog. He requested the members of government to start a dialog with the RA citizens “even with those who are blinded because of hatred.” Two days ago when answering the questions of citizens on TV Sargsyan once again assured that the polarization must be relieved. “I was never against a dialog but it’s quite clear to everyone that a dialog always has an address. Who is with whom if the first president claims that he has 65% of the votes? He won’t agree with the Constitutional Court verdict and will keep calling me a Mongol-Tatar, a bandit. What dialog can we speak about? But I guess starting from March 2 we have been cooperating with all political leaders who have an intention like that regardless of the level of their anger and hatred” (www.panorama.am). In his turn Levon Ter-Petrosyan has several times expressed his willingness to start the dialog if the government provides certain conditions (e.g. releasing the arrested citizens). During his press conference on March 11 in his house Ter-Petrosyan didn’t exclude the possibility of the dialog. “I will not accept Serzh Sargsyan’s legitimacy but it doesn’t mean that I won’t speak with him. He has power, governmental levers. How can I ignore him? He cannot ignore me either. I also have people behind me. He does now but sooner or later he will live with that” (168 Zham newspaper). By considering all this one can get even more confused. The international community is gradually making stricter statements, demands the government to call the opposition to a roundtable. Both sides say that they are ready for a dialog but so far there is no progress in this direction except for mere statement.
