– Mr. Hovhannisyan, you and many other experts predicted the Georgian-Ossetian war. It turns out that Armenia had enough time to find alternative ways as well as find new angles of negotiations of Karabakh conflict.
– Of course, yes, if we had a realistic foreign policy and enforced our own decisions and if we didn’t sacrifice the state interests to the private own everything would be OK. Indeed, that way we would be able to find alternative ways, save resources, develop programs and try to maintain our road communication, which would enable us to maintain land communication with our main strategic partner Russia. We would also be able to develop a few negotiation programs related to the NKR conflict.
– There is an opinion that Armenia is in a profitable position in terms of the NKR conflict resolution. Do you think so too?
– I wouldn’t say so. I think that the situation is profitable for Armenian-Turkish relations. However, this 5-day war created certain tension in the whole region. And this tension spreads on Armenia too. Here the most significant thing is the regional security system, which doesn’t exist. We have appeared in the intersection of two global security systems – the NATO and the Collective Security Pact. This creates a quite problematic situation. The whole process of war is initiated to struggle for the dominance of three seas. Most of the process of conflicts on the Balkans is over and now the whole focus is on the Caucasus connected with the security of the Caspian and Black Seas. Armenia is in the middle of these two basins. The most part of the Black Sea coast countries are already NATO members and it’s quite understandable that Russia is trying to fortify its positions in the Black Sea, otherwise it will only have its Novorossiysk and Tuapse coasts. Moreover, according to the Monroe Treaty Russia doesn’t even have an actual way of accessing its battle ships to the Black Sea. The only actual anchor is Sebastopol, the agreement of which is going to expire in 2017. By its completion Russia is getting deprived of its military anchor in the Black Sea, which has always had an essential impact on the Russian history. It is quite understandable that on one hand Russia needs to fortify itself in the Abkhazian coast and on the other hand make Georgia obedient by including it in its influence zone.
– On the other hand it may try to alternate the direction of the Ukrainian policy. At any rate, many of the world experts find Russia involvement an attempt to prevent uni-polarization of the world.
– No, this fake ideology uni-polarization was destroyed when the US intruded Iraq. It is when the US ignored the opinion of the EU and the UN Security Council (Russia and Chine vetoed the intrusion) and intruded Iraq. The world almost unanimously expressed its negative opinion about that. Since then there is no ideology of uni-polarization. It is another thing that the US still claims that it is the only state that carries a full responsibility for the world processes. This claim is being refused by other great states.
– Georgia and Ukraine are trying to become NATO members. However, among those countries Azerbaijan is also mentioned.
– I wouldn’t include Azerbaijan among them. Azerbaijan is conducting a very flexible policy by intending to strengthen its role as a transit country in the region and also more globally – in the world. In this regard Azerbaijan realizes that it is quite demanded. It is quite clear that this region in the aspect of conflicts is full with resources. It means that the greater states consider this region as a political resource for them. They may reuse the controlled conflict or they may even freeze it. Russia is currently trying to take away this dominance from the west and first of all from the US. This is the main goal of the Russian-Georgian war – destroy the resource and thus decrease their presence in the region.
– From what you are saying we may presume that the efforts of the three states of the region, including Armenia, to conduct their own policy, are subject to failure.
– No. I am sure that if our three states conduct a cold and calm policy, and use commonsense instead of mentioning the past, their union may become a serious force in the region, which may be called “South Caucasian Union.” In order to achieve this thee countries should slightly sacrifice their sovereignty for the establishment of such a union.
– However, at this stage this scenario is almost impossible.
– I perfectly remember how John Mane was considered a fantasizing person. That’s when he offered this idea after the World War II. He first offered it to France, Great Britain and Germany. Because of that he was considered an idealist, fantasy-man, author of senseless ideas. But you see what we have now. The European Union was established and it functions till now. I think in order to survive these two countries have to come to this agreement and join in a union. But it would be better if it happened soon than late because the opportunities may fade.
– At present it is extremely urgent to persuade Azerbaijan to sign an agreement of mutual actions and regional security. This issue is so urgent than it should be initiated as soon as possible. Are you trying to say that?
– I don’t think it is so urgent however the necessity of such an agreement exists since 1994. When the agreement of cease-fire was signed it was immediately understood that it is necessary to sign a more constant agreement on refusing to ever use military force. And if one of the sides violates those principles it will be considered a violator of international norms. This will be a productive step anyway; it will strengthen the mutual trust among the states. Plus, it will create more serious grounds for the resolution of the conflict and progress to the negotiation process. This will become the basis of the establishment of the South Caucasian Union. Of course, the situation is not favorable to it at this stage. Georgia has its own complicated issues, Armenia and Azerbaijan are separated because of the NKR conflict but the establishment of that union will resolve the NKR conflict because there won’t be any internal borders, etc. But let me repeat that the lack of trust, tension and hostility level are so high at present that it would be nonsense to suggest such a thing. However, this may be the prospect of the future.
– In the beginning of the conversation you mentioned that if the authorities of Armenia thought of the global issues instead of their private ones they could have made the right decisions regarding the Georgian-Ossetian conflict. How do you see the policy, which Armenia conducts at this stage?
– I don’t see any policy that Armenia conducts. And I assess this inaction very negatively. And what are we going to do? Will be try to somehow postpone the recognition of Abkhazia and Ossetia? Afterward, they will stop the inflow of our gas and several bridges and roads will be blown up. Then we will have to recognize. I think that we should stay loyal to the principles that we adopted and that is the right of the nations to determine their identity. And all the possible cases like that must be recognized. We will have to recognize certain things and refuse to recognize the others. These are the consequences of a passive policy. If the Armenian-Turkish relations improve we will receive new opportunities for the game with Iran. This is an extra resource for us just like the ones related to the conflict resolution. We very poorly benefit from the current state of Armenian-Turkish relations. Nevertheless, I think that the prospect of the relief of such tension is possible.
– When you say “relief of tension” do you imply it in the context of Gul’s visit to Armenia or do you see more serious prospects?
– No, I don’t think that Gul is an unserious person to decide to visit Armenia and meanwhile ignoring the fact of the existence of the Genocide memorial. But I think he is a serious person and if the pressure is not very strong he won’t visit Armenia. But the visit is of course a positive step.
– Do you think the invitation was also a positive step?
– Yes, the invitation is also a positive step. Now the ball is in their field but agreeing to establish a commission of historians as a response to the invitation is a negative step. It means that we should take out the invitation from the context. The invitation was issued and it was an expression of good will and Armenia’s willingness to normalize relations was emphasized. Meanwhile we have always mentioned that we are ready to normalize relations without any preconditions. No we should follow our principles. The establishment of the commission is a precondition, which we mustn’t abide with. On the other hand there was a reconciling commission on Turkish-Armenian relations. It had reached serious outcome. It established the first legal document, which gave a legal evaluation to the Genocide. Besides that a road map of regulating relations was established, which was handed to the Presidents of the two counties. It means that a commission had already existed; it worked and gave its assessment. What’s the point of establishing a new one? I think our only success is that when our authorities make pro-Armenian decisions. Whenever they try to be pro-western we have our loss and damage. The priority is the interest of Armenia; then the security system of Armenia as international Diaspora and thirdly our intentions and goals, which can bring benefit to us.
– Can Armenia allow itself to conduct a policy, which reflects only our interests or perhaps as a “younger brother” to Russia we should expect their reaction and that the whole responsibility is in the Kremlin?
– I think that after the events of October 27 Armenia is gradually losing its sovereignty and it is quite evident as during the past 10 years we have abided much loss and failure in terms of our sovereignty. It doesn’t mean that Armenia shouldn’t have allies. We all agree that our strategic ally is Russia but most importantly Armenia must behave as a sovereign and independent state.
– The reason is that our country doesn’t demonstrate itself in a quite dignified manner. It is perhaps the fault of our presidents, who always turn out to have problems with legitimacy.
– The reason is the contradiction between bribery, corruption, morality and the standards that the authorities bring up.
– The president of the country called the people for unity. How urgent this issue of unity is for Armenia?
– Armenia is currently not in a situation when the people should be made to consolidate with the government. A similar thing happened in Georgia for a short time. I receive letters from my friends in Georgia, who are members of the Georgian Republican Party. They perfectly understand that Sahakashvili is immature, adventurous. However, they have to consolidate with him because there is a foreign army in their territory. I think this consolidation will be gone very soon because the parents of the perished soldiers will raise their voice.